The Punjab kings take on the Kolkata Knight Riders on day 21 of the Indian Premier League, and our expert tipster has cast their eye over the big match. He’s taken a look at both teams’ starts to the season, and feels a win for the Punjab Kings is the more likely outcome in a game between two sides with pretty awful starts to the year.
Punjab Kings v Kolkata Knight Riders
26th April
Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad
Live on Sky Sports Cricket
Punjab Kings v Kolkata Knight Riders Preview
Neither of these sides have started the season particularly well, despite first day wins. The Knight Riders beat the Sunrisers Hyderabad on day three of the season, and the Kings beat the Rajasthan Royals the next day. Since then, they each went three games without a win and are already looking bad for their hopes of qualification for the play-offs this year. The head-to-head records are heavily on the side of the Kolkata Knight Riders in this game. The sides have squared off 27 times, 18 of which have been taken by Kolkata while 9 were won by the Punjab Kings. Within the last five years, the Punjab Kings have only won three of the 10 games they’ve played, including one last year. Luckily for these sides, there has to be a winner and a loser today, so one team will be leaving with a big win.
Punjab Kings v Kolkata Knight Riders Odds
Punjab Kings slightly edge this game as favourites and we’re offering 10/13 odds on both a Punjab Kings win and 1/1 on a Kolkata Night Riders victory. If you’re a big enough risk-taker to back a draw, you’ll get wide odds of TBD, but that’s never happened before in this fixture so we can’t recommend it.
Punjab Kings v Kolkata Knight Riders Tips
Both sides actually won their opening fixtures. Punjab Kings beat the Rajasthan Royals, while the Knight Riders got a big victory against the Sunrisers Hyderabad. Our win probability calculator has it remarkably close, so it is really anyone’s game. We’re backing the legendary KL Rahul to be the top batsman for the Punjab Kings, and Nitish Rana to be top batsman for KKR.
KL Rahul to be home team top batsman – 2/1
He opened the season by winning in this market, and he was very close in their game against the Delhi Capitals. We think he’ll have another good game this time around and be top batsman for the Punjab Kings.
Nitish Rana to be away team’s top batsman – 3/1
He started the season with consecutive showings as top batsman for the Kolkata Knight Riders, but hasn’t been as strong since. We think he’ll be back against the Punjab Kings.
Squads
Punjab Kings Squad
KL Rahul (c/wk), Mayank Agarwal, Chris Gayle, Mandeep Singh, Prabsimran Singh, Nicholas Pooran (wk), Sarfaraz Khan, Deepak Hooda, Murugan Ashwin, Ravi Bishnoi, Harpreet Brar, Mohammed Shami, Arshdeep Singh, Ishan Porel, Darshan Nalkande, Chris Jordan, Dawid Malan, Jhye Richardson, Shahrukh Khan, Riley Meredith, Moises Henriques, Jalaj Saxena, Utkarsh Singh, Fabian Allen, Saurabh Kumar
Kolkata Knight Riders Squad
Eoin Morgan (captain), Dinesh Karthik, Shubman Gill, Nitish Rana, Tim Seifert, Rinku Singh, Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Kuldeep Yadav, Shivam Mavi, Lockie Ferguson, Pat Cummins, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Sandeep Warrier, Prasidh Krishna, Rahul Tripathi, Varun Chakravarthy, Shakib Al Hasan, Sheldon Jackson, Vaibhav Arora, Harbhajan Singh, Karun Nair, Ben Cutting, Venkatesh Iyer and Pawan Negi.
For more betting odds on the 2021 Indian Premier League, head over to the NetBet Cricket page.
*Odds are subject to change.
