Punjab have lost two matches and won won. Openers M Vijay and Manan Vohra seem in good touch, but the same can not be said of David Miller and Shaun Marsh, two of their most influential players.
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What did Kings XI do differently? You can follow Live Scores and commentary for today’s IPL match between Kings XI Punjab (KXIP) vs Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) with us here.
Kings XI Punjab medium pacer Sandeep Sharma (2 for 23) and spinner Mohit Sharma (3 for 23) bowled on a disciplined line to restrict Pune to 152 for 7. Sunil Narine has added sting to the Kolkata attack. However, Shaun Marsh and David Miller, the other superstars of the Punjab line-up have been unimpressive in the tournament so far and they got out for single digit scores in the last game as well. From the team that thumped Sunrisers Hyderabad on Saturday, only Suryakumar Yadav hadn’t played global cricket. The Knights too came up with a win in their last game after the loss against the Mumbai Indians. However, they will have to guard against complacency and the format’s tendency to throw up upsets. He has played for Kings XI since the start of IPL and those sweetly-timed cover drives leave many followers wondering why he isn’t a regular member of the Australian side. His return to form is a good news.
Bowling with a remodelled action, Narine was eased into the tournament in a low-pressure scenario. He finished with an economy rate of 6.5, which indicates he still commands the respect of the batsmen. He would not want to change the winning combination of the team. On a low-bounce Mohali track, Kolkata will rely heavily on the likes of Andre Russell, apart from the pace of Morkel and Yadav. The trend continued for the two Indian Premier League games so far.
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KINGS XI PUNJAB: As for Punjab, Glenn Maxwell’s late cameo in the last game, wherein he finished the game for his side against the Rising Pune Supergiants after having come in to bat in a precarious situation, would give them a lot of joy, as he has been one of the mainstays for the team over the past three years and had failed to perform in the first couple of games. Gambhir carried on after the fall of Uthappa, and with Barinder Sran getting some assistance from the pitch in the later overs, he made sure that target was achieved without any hiccups in the end.
