Kolkata Knight Riders suffered a double blow as their two champion spinners Varun Chakravarthy and Sunil Narine have been ruled out of their IPL 2026 match against the Punjab Kings at the Eden Gardens. KKR have already lost two matches in the 19th season, and they need contributions from the top players to return to winning ways. Mumbai Indians and Sunrisers Hyderabad thumped them in the previous contests, and the absence of Varun and Sunil is going to impact them against the Shreyas Iyer-led team.
Chakravarthy was injured while taking a catch in the previous contest against SRH, while Narine is not well, leaving the three-time champions short on firepower.
“We have two forced changes. Varun Chakravarthy was injured in the last game, while Sunil Narine is unwell. Rovman Powell and Navdeep Saini are playing,” KKR captain Ajinkya Rahane said after winning the toss.
“We are batting first as the wicket is good, but it is on the drier side. We want to put runs on the board. It is important to win small moments and execute our plans. The boys are looking forward to the contest,” he added.
PBKS skipper Shreyas Iyer was looking to bowl first, and he got what he wanted.
“We wanted to bowl first. Our coach, Ricky Ponting, gives freedom to all the players, and he is one of the legends of the game. He shares his ideas and experience with us,” Iyer said.
Playing XIs
Kolkata Knight Riders: Finn Allen, Ajinkya Rahane, Cameron Green, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Rovman Powell, Rinku Singh, Ramandeep Singh, Anukul Roy, Navdeep Saini, Vaibhav Arora, Kartik Tyagi
KKR Impact Subs: Manish Pandey, Tejasvi Singh, Rahul Tripathi, Saurabh Dubey, Blessing Muzarabani
Punjab Kings: Prabhsimran Singh (wk), Cooper Connolly, Shreyas Iyer (capt), Nehal Wadhera, Shashank Singh, Marcus Stoinis, Marco Jansen, Xavier Bartlett, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Arshdeep Singh, Yuzvendra Chahal
PBKS Impact Subs: Suryansh Shedge, Vishnu Vinod, Pravin Dubey, Priyansh Arya, Harpreet Brar
