The inaugural match of IPL twenty20 will be played between Sauav Ganguly lead Kolkata Knight Riders and Rahul Dravid lead Bangalore Royal Challengers in M.Chinnaswamy stadium. Of the two team Kolkara Knight Riders is strongest than Bangalore Royal Challangers in all department. Kolkata Knight Riders is owned by Bollywood Badshah Shah Rukh Khan while Bangalore Royal Challangers is owned by Vijay malya. According to IPL rule any team can only play four foreign players in a match. So that means Kolkata Knight Riders will go with Ricky Ponting, Chris Gayle/Salman Butt, Umar Gull and Brandum Mccullum. Bangalore IPL will miss some of their star player in the first match like Anil Kumble, Dayle Steyn and Nathan Bracken. Anil Kumble is suffering from injury while Dale Steyn is playing at domestic matches in South Africa. Kolkata Knight Riders will miss their fast bowler Shoiab Akhtar due to ban imposed on him by PCB. Saurav Ganguly team looks more strong because of the presence of Australian Captain Ricky Ponting, the hard hitting New Zealand wicket keeper Brandum McCullum, Chris Gayle and professional coach like John Buchanan. In bowling department also they have quality bowling attack like Umar Gull, Ishant Sharma and Ajit Agarkar. Many people expecting Kolkata Kight Riders to beat Bangalore Royal Challengers easily however in twenty20 format any team can beat any one. With only four overseas player allowed in a team, its unlikely that Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Cameron White will both play and White's excellent Twenty20 record puts him ahead. With Anil Kumble ruled out through injury, White is also placed to take the lone spinner's slot ahead of local lad KP Appanna. Kallis and Mark Boucher were expected to leave for the South African domestic Twenty20 competition but will now stay back but with Dale Steyn absent, Noffke could easily fill in. Misbah-ul-Haq will miss the opening clash because of the ongoing series in Pakistan and Shivnarine Chanderpaul is reportedly carrying an injury so another of the local boys, B Akhil or Bharat Chipli, could come into the middle order. Likely Playing XI for both the teams (Match will start from 20:00 PM India time) Kolkata Knight Riders: David Hussey, Chris Gayle, Ricky Ponting, Saurav Ganguly (Captain), Brendon McCullum, Debabrata Das, Laxmi Ratan Shukla, Ajit Agarkar, Murali Karthik, Ishant Sharma, Ashok Dinda, John Buchanan (Coach) Bangalore Royal Challengers: Wasim Jaffer, Jaques Kallis, Rahul Dravid (Captain), Virat Kohli, Cameron White, Mark Boucher, B Akhil, Zaheer Khan, Praveen Kumar, Ashley Noffke, R Vinay Kumar, V.Prasad (Coach). |
