Rajasthan Royals and Kolkata Knight Riders in desperate shootout for playoff spot
Both teams will still need other results to go their way, but they themselves need to win first
Alagappan Muthu
31-Oct-2020
Big picture
Ben Stokes is firing, with bat and ball. Sanju Samson seems to have rediscovered his early season form. Jos Buttler is prepared to play finisher. And Jofra Archer - bubble fatigue or not - is almost unplayable. Talk about peaking at the almost-too-late-but-not-quite time.
The Rajasthan Royals are still in IPL 2020. They will stay there with a victory over the Kolkata Knight Riders on Sunday but they will need help from elsewhere if they are to qualify for the playoffs. Both teams will be keeping an especially watchful eye on the evening game because if the Kings XI Punjab win that, things get dicey.
The Knight Riders are in a similar position. But the problem is their net run-rate (-0.467) is so low that they will not only have to win their last match, they have to hope no other team ties with them on 14 points.
In the news
If ever there was a time for Andre Russell, it is now. But the allrounder hasn't played a game in two weeks and in the absence of any update from the Knight Riders, it is likely that he won't be fit for this one either.
Likely XIs
Kolkata Knight Riders: 1 Shubman Gill, 2 Nitish Rana, 3 Rahul Tripathi, 4 Sunil Narine, 5 Eoin Morgan (capt), 6 Dinesh Karthik (wk), 7 Rinku Singh/Prasidh Krishna, 8 Pat Cummins, 9 Lockie Ferguson, 10 Kamlesh Nagarkoti, 11 Varun Chakravarthy
Rajasthan Royals: 1 Ben Stokes, 2 Robin Uthappa, 3 Sanju Samson (wk), 4 Steven Smith (capt), 5 Jos Buttler, 6 Riyan Parag, 7 Rahul Tewatia, 8 Jofra Archer, 9 Shreyas Gopal, 10 Varun Aaron/Ankit Rajpoot, 11 Kartik Tyagi
Previous meeting
Defending 174, the Knight Riders' fast bowlers Shivam Mavi and Kamlesh Nagarkoti ripped through the Royals - four of the top five fell for single digits - to seal a 37-run win.
Strategy punt
Stats that matter
Alagappan Muthu is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo