Nitish Rana and Sanju Samson at the toss (Pic Credit: Sportzpics)
Kolkata Knight Riders included Anukul Roy in the starting XI as he replaced Vaibhav Arora.
Rajasthan Royals skipper Sanju Samson won the toss and elected to bowl against Kolkata Knight Riders in the Indian Premier League match at Eden Gardens, Kolkata. Samson’s luck with the toss continues as guessed the flip of the coin right but this time he chose to bowl first.
Royals made a couple of changes in their XI after suffering defeats in the last three matches. Trent Boult returned to the XI and replaced Kuldip Yadav, while KM Asif replaced Murugan Ashwin.
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While Kolkata Knight Riders included Anukul Roy in the starting XI as he replaced Vaibhav Arora.
Samson suggested that they need to change the approach after losing in the last few matches.
“We will bowl here first. Long tournament, need to change according to the strength and weaknesses. Couple of changes for us – Boult replaces Kuldip Yadav, KM Asif replaces Murugan Ashwin. Root will bat at 4. It’s a long tournament, we have had some tough games for the bowlers, the morale of the team is high, not easy to forget close losses, but we need to move on,” Samson said at the toss.
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Meanwhile, Rana revealed the reason for including an extra spinner in the XI for Thursday’s clash.
“I think we’re getting the type of pitches we want. We will have to play good cricket, take one game at a time and earn 2 points. One change for us – Anukul Roy replaces Vaibhav Arora. Looks like the pitch is dry, they haven’t watered a lot, so we are playing that extra spinner and add some depth to the batting,” Rana said.
Kolkata Knight Riders (Playing XI): Rahmanullah Gurbaz(w), Jason Roy, Venkatesh Iyer, Nitish Rana(c), Andre Russell, Rinku Singh, Sunil Narine, Shardul Thakur, Anukul Roy, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakaravarthy
KKR impact subs: Suyash Sharma, Vaibhav Arora, N Jagadeesan, Umesh Yadav, Lockie Ferguson
Rajasthan Royals (Playing XI): Yashasvi Jaiswal, Jos Buttler, Sanju Samson(w/c), Joe Root, Dhruv Jurel, Shimron Hetmyer, Ravichandran Ashwin, Trent Boult, Sandeep Sharma, KM Asif, Yuzvendra Chahal
RR impact subs: Donavon Ferreira, Devdutt Padikkal, Riyan Parag, Murugan Ashwin and Navdeep Saini
