Kolkata takes on Chennai in a do-die clash to retain their playoff hopes in Indian T20 League 2020.
Match Timings: Oct 29, 7:30 PM
Team Preview
Kolkata finds themselves in a nutshell of errors and it led them to a potential elimination from the playoffs. The loss against Punjab has changed their journey and they moved to 5th after retaining 4th spot for around three weeks. One more loss will create a blunder for them as they face next Rajasthan and the game will be a knock out itself. Kolkata had a roller coaster journey. Their players are showing slight glimpses and fade away later with the same loose approach. You cannot pick one player who remained consistent apart from the skipper Morgan. The same happened with the bowling unit which hasn’t delivered much. Russell might be ignored or Morgan could try something different with dropping either Cummins and Ferguson to add him at finishing end. The struggling approach is a big worrying sign and McCullum needs to tell their unit to play counter cricket in virtual knock out games.
Meanwhile, Chennai are already out of the playoff race and they are just playing with a free mindset to gain moral victories in the end. Chennai saw the missing spark against Bangalore with an 8-wickets victory, riding on youngsters Gaikwad and Curran. Dhoni has already shown the intent to try youngsters and Monu Kumar was also introduced in the previous game. It is unlikely that the skipper will make any change in the squad, keeping in mind the surface of Dubai. Two main spinners Santner and Tahir can easily trouble Kolkata and their playoffs hopes. The win in the last game also boosted their confidence. Chennai has nothing to lose but they can make a last try to avoid a bottom finish this season.
Pitch Report
Dubai’s surface is a bit dry and it provides a good amount of help to spin. The track get slow and spinners take advantage. The sluggish behaviour can trouble batsman to read balls clearly. Chasing is not an ideal call on this track.
Possible XI
Chennai
Ruturaj Gaikwad, Faf du Plessis, Ambati Rayudu, N Jagadeesan, MS Dhoni (c & wk), Sam Curran, Ravindra Jadeja, Mitchell Santner, Deepak Chahar, Imran Tahir, Monu Kumar
Kolkata
Shubman Gill, Nitish Rana, Rahul Tripathi, Dinesh Karthik (wk), Eoin Morgan (c), Sunil Narine, Pat Cummins, Lockie Ferguson, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Prasidh Krishna, Varun Chakravarthy
Key Players
Chennai
Faf du Plessis
This season – M: 12, Runs: 401, Avg: 40.10
Sam Curran
This season – M: 12, Runs: 173, Wickets: 13
Kolkata
Eoin Morgan
This season – M: 12, Runs: 335, Avg: 37.22
Shubman Gill
This season – M: 12, Runs: 378, Avg: 34.36
