All eyes on Russell as KKR look to sustain winning momentum

It's been close to three weeks since Rinku Singh's stunning assault against Gujarat Titans which helped Kolkata Knight Riders pull off an incredible win at the Narendra Modi Stadium. And it has been a contrasting campaign for the two teams since then. The defending champions have won three since that loss to KKR and are sitting pretty in the top half of the points table with 10 points. The Knight Riders, on the other hand, suffered four losses before steadying themselves on the points ladder with a win against Royal Challengers Bangalore. They still are fourth from the bottom with six points and will hope for sustenance of momentum to keep them afloat for a position in the top four.

KKR and GT top the charts currently for most wickets among wrist spinners in this IPL and the clash at the Eden Gardens will be a battle of one-upmanship between the spinners of both sides. That said, GT's pacers have also done a good job of chipping away at the opposition wickets, with the Indian duo of Mohammed Shami and Mohit Sharma having bagged 16 wickets between them. While Alzarri Joseph has also been amongst the wickets, Noor Ahmad's recent success has kept the West Indian pacer out of action in the last few games.

In contrast, KKR's overseas duo of Tim Southee and Lockie Ferguson proved to be very expensive in the opportunities they got, forcing the Knight Riders to look for pace options beyond them. With Umesh Yadav struggling to make an impact and Shardul Thakur recovering from an injury, KKR have been severely short-staffed in the pace department, with only Andre Russell providing them some solace. On the other hand, Varun Chakaravarthy and Suyash Sharma, with 22 wickets between them, have carried most of the bowling workload and were key in some of their victories, including the one against RCB.

The arrival of Jason Roy has provided the Knight Riders' batting department a shot in the arm, with the England batter fresh off a brisk half-century against RCB. Although KKR have used six different opening combinations so far, Roy's 83-run partnership with N Jagadeesan in the previous game - KKR's only half-century opening stand in the IPL 2023 thus far - will have finally pointed the team management to the right choice at the top of the order. The likes of Venkatesh Iyer, Nitish Rana and Rinku have been contributing but KKR will hope for some runs from Russell's bat.

For the Titans, Shubman Gill tops their batting chart while there have been good performances from the rest of the batters too in what has been a collective effort so far. But in comparison to the KKR's batters, GT have been lagging slightly in terms of strike rates and they'll be hoping that