Indian Premier League (IPL) defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) are in a precarious place forward of the upcoming season as they might be with out the companies of earlier season’s mentor Gautam Gambhir, assistant coach and academy head Abhishek Nayar and assistant coach Ryan ten Doeschate. The trio have joined the Indian cricket crew as head coach and assistant coaches respectively, and positively depart a void within the KKR dugout.Whereas Dwayne Bravo has joined the aspect as mentor, different positions must be stuffed.
Along with the backroom workers, early indications are that the captaincy position will not be easy both. Shreyas Iyer joined KKR when he was purchased for Rs 12.25 crore on the 2022 public sale and it is understood that the franchise is keen to retain the Mumbai batter however not as their prime retention.
Forward of October 31 deadline, Andre Russell is the entrance runner to be retained with a hefty price ticket. The all-rounder was earlier retained for Rs 12 crore by KKR and may be very prone to get a considerable elevate.
If issues do not go per Iyer’s liking, will he discover completely different choices? In case he appears to be like that method, the right-hander is predicted to set the public sale on hearth as a result of many groups – Royal Challengers Bengaluru, Punjab Kings, Delhi Capitals – are within the want of a captain. And an Indian captain is all the time wanted.
Punjab will not thoughts loosening their purse strings for the right-hander contemplating he had a profitable partnership with Ricky Ponting, now PBKS head coach, at DC and the 2 have been collectively once they reached the ultimate in 2020.
Equally, do not be stunned if DC discover the Iyer possibility, too, as a result of he was a confirmed chief for them and Rishabh Pant is unlikely to steer the aspect this season.
Even final yr, when Iyer was getting back from damage lay-off, there was a piece within the KKR camp which wished to proceed with Nitish Rana, who was standby captain in Iyer’s absence, as chief for 2024 season.
The franchise, nonetheless, “introduced” Iyer as captain earlier than the event bought underway. The assertion did elevate a number of eyebrows as Iyer was the unique captain and Rana was solely doing the job in his absence, and plenty of felt the announcement was completely pointless.
Shah Rukh Khan co-owned KKR are one of many franchises who advocated for a smaller public sale, and pushed for extra Proper to Match (RTM). It is a technique they’re probably to make use of on the upcoming public sale.
There are extra tempting retention choices in Rinku Singh, Harshit Rana (uncapped), Mitchell Starc and Varun Chakravarthy however it will likely be fascinating to see how a lot the defending champs are keen to spend.
They’ve an issue of loads on that entrance however it’s their captaincy piece which might be keenly adopted by different franchises too.
