KKR vs MI, IPL 2020 Preview: Dinesh Karthik's Knights face wounded champions Mumbai Indians

Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) open their Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020 campaign against defending champions Mumbai Indians (MI) at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday action cricketing action continues in the T20 tournament.

While Mumbai Indians will be gunning to make a comeback after their season opener defeat against Chennai Super Kings, Kolkata Knight Riders would be hoping to put the ‘Bogey Team’ tag away from Mumbai Indians and start their IPL 2020 journey with a win. 

KKR have an exciting side on paper with the addition of Eoin Morgan, Pat Cummins and Tom Banton expected to add that extra layer of depth to their squad. Selecting the playing XI will be headache for Brendon McCullum and skipper Dinesh Karthik with plenty of top quality options available at their helm. Andre Russell is expected to do the heavy-lifting for the Kolkata outfit.

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Whereas MI will be looking to stick with the same XI and get it going in the UAE. They might look to bring in Nathan Coulter-Nile, depending on his fitness, in place of James Pattinson. MI have a world-class squad with the likes of Rohit Sharma, Quinton de Kock, Pandya brothers, Jasprit Bumrah and Trent Boult among others.

However, they would be wary of the threat possessed by the likes of Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Morgan and others. KKR have an interesting bowling unit as well with plenty of domestic pacers but all eyes will be on their ace spinner Kuldeep Yadav, who had a torrid outing last time in IPL 2019. 

Talking about head-to-head encounters, it has been a one-way traffic with Mumbai Indians winning 19 of their matches whereas KKR have won just 6.

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A score of around 160 is expected in Abu Dhabi with the dew factor coming into the play in second innings. 

Squads:

Kolkata Knight Riders Squad: Shubman Gill, Sunil Narine, Nitish Rana, Eoin Morgan, Dinesh Karthik(w/c), Andre Russell, Pat Cummins, Kuldeep Yadav, Shivam Mavi, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Prasidh Krishna, Rahul Tripathi, Siddhesh Lad, Sandeep Warrier, Nikhil Naik, Chris Green, Lockie Ferguson, Rinku Singh, Ali Khan, Tom Banton, Varun Chakravarthy, Manimaran Siddharth

Mumbai Indians Squad: Rohit Sharma(c), Quinton de Kock(w), Suryakumar Yadav, Saurabh Tiwary, Hardik Pandya, Kieron Pollard, Krunal Pandya, James Pattinson, Rahul Chahar, Trent Boult, Jasprit Bumrah, Chris Lynn, Aditya Tare, Dhawal Kulkarni, Mitchell McClenaghan, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Jayant Yadav, Ishan Kishan, Anmolpreet Singh, Anukul Roy, Mohsin Khan, Sherfane Rutherford, Digvijay Deshmukh, Prince Balwant Rai