KKR bring in Johnson for Moeen, ask unchanged LSG to bat first

Toss Kolkata Knight Riders chose to bowl vs Lucknow Super Giants

Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) captain Ajinkya Rahane won the toss and chose to bowl in Tuesday's afternoon game at Eden Gardens against Lucknow Super Giants (LSG). KKR made one change for the home game, replacing allrounder Moeen Ali with left-arm seamer Spencer Johnson. LSG named an unchanged team.

"The wicket looks really good," Rahane said at the toss to Danny Morrison. "It hasn't been that hot in Kolkata, wickets will not change [in the second half]. Everybody is looking forward to this game after all our units did well in the last game [against Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH)]."

Rahane said KKR were not worried about their opening partnerships not clicking, backing Quinton de Kock and Sunil Narine at the top. "People are going to talk about it," he said. "Sunil and Quinny are match-winners, so we are not worried."

LSG captain Rishabh Pant said he wasn't very happy with the team's start to IPL 2025 - they have won two and lost two so far - but hoped for an upward trend in this critical period of the season. They fielded the same team that defeated Mumbai Indians (MI) on Friday.

KKR's decision to field first was an interesting one because captains in day games have preferred to bat so far this season. The team batting first has also won eight of the last 17 games at this venue.

This fixture is a rescheduled one. It was originally meant to be held on Sunday, April 6. The game was moved to Tuesday after local police said they were not in a position to provide security owing to the Navratri festivities in the city that day.

Kolkata Knight Riders: Quinton de Kock (wk), Sunil Narine, Ajinkya Rahane (capt), Venkatesh Iyer, Rinku Singh, Andre Russell, Ramandeep Singh, Vaibhav Arora, Spencer Johnson, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakravarthy
Impact subs: Manish Pandey, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Anukul Roy, Rovman Powell, Luvnith Sissodia

Lucknow Super Giants: Mitchell Marsh, Aiden Markram, Nicholas Pooran, Rishabh Pant (capt, wk), Ayush Badoni, Abdul Samad, David Miller, Shardul Thakur, Akash Deep, Avesh Khan, Digvesh Rathi
Impact subs: Ravi Bishnoi, Prince Yadav, Shahbaz Ahmed, Matthew Breetzke, Himmat Singh