KKR begin camp early after disastrous season

The Kolkata Knight Riders' Bengal players and four of their other Indian players had a training session at the Eden Gardens on Wednesday. Sourav Ganguly, their icon player in the first two seasons, was also present and passed on tips to the practising youngsters.

Ganguly said the camp was particularly useful for the younger members of the side. "Most of these boys get busy for the Ranji Trophy so getting hold of them after the season begins gets difficult," he said. "We want to make them understand certain things which are required so that it will be easier later down the line.

"At present, I am just trying to work with them and making them understand what is required of them," he said. "We have about seven months to go and hopefully, this will help them in the preparation for first-class matches also."

Bengal's Wriddhiman Saha, Laxmi Ratan Shukla, Arindam Ghosh, Debabrata Das, Ashok Dinda, Sourav Sarkar and Avik Chowdhury and outstation players Anureet Singh, Sunny Singh, Mohnish Parmar and Natraj Behera were all part of the camp.

Kolkata had a disastrous 2009 season, finishing in last place, and subsequently sacked their coach John Buchanan. Brendon McCullum had led the side last season, but with his international commitments ruling him out of a part of the 2010 campaign, Kolkata are without a captain for next season.