Kuldeep Yadav not playing: The spinner from Kolkata Knight Riders has been benched for today’s match in Sharjah.
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During the 16th match of the ongoing 13th season of the Indian Premier League between Delhi Capitals and Kolkata Knight Riders in Sharjah, Kolkata Knight Riders captain Dinesh Karthik has won the toss and chose to field.
“Going to bowl first. Maybe a little bit to do with the dew. Both games so far have gone with the bowling team. We’re on the right path. Wanted to add depth to our batting. This is like every Indian ground we play on. Nothing new,” Karthik said during the toss.
“Would’ve also looked to bowl considering the dew. Wicket looks amazing. Happy to bat as well. Have talked about it. Have got slow starts in the last few games. Important we don’t lose wickets in pp. Have batsmen who can come in the later half and cover up,” Delhi Capitals captain Shreyas Iyer said during the toss.
Why is Kuldeep Yadav not playing today’s match vs Delhi Capitals?
As far as the changes for Delhi are concerned, they have decided to include spinner Ravichandran Ashwin and pacer Harshal Patel for all-rounder Axar Patel and pacer Ishant Sharma.
Kolkata, on the other hand, have made a lone change in including batsman Rahul Tripathi for spinner Kuldeep Yadav. In the nine overs that Yadav bowled in three matches, he had conceded 74 runs but dismissed only one batsman.
Since the start of IPL 2019, Yadav has picked only five wickets in 12 T20s for KKR at an average of 72, an economy rate of 8.57 and a strike rate of 50.40.
With KKR having a plethora of batting options, they might have thought about strengthening their batting division by bringing in Tripathi.
It will be interesting to see if the right-hand batsman is made to open the batting alongside Shubman Gill. The same would mean a demotion for all-rounder Sunil Narine who had been opening the batting for Knight Riders for quite sometime now.
