IPL 2021: Kolkata Knight Riders’ Head Coach Brendon McCullum hints about the availability of Sunil Narine in the next game

IPL 2021: Kolkata Knight Riders’ Head Coach Brendon McCullum hints about the availability of Sunil Narine in the next game

Sunil Narine

Kolkata Knight Riders were defeated by Royal Challengers Bangalore by 38 runs in their last match at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai, losing their second game in a row in the IPL 2021. Kolkata’s fixtures in Chennai have come to an end, and they will now move to Mumbai. Brendon McCullum, the team’s head coach, spoke on the team’s defeat and the changes he aims to do in their next game.

According to Kolkata Knight Riders head coach Brendon McCullum, Sunil Narine, the bowling all-rounder was not fully fit, and therefore was not available for selection for the team’s first three games.

Looking at the Knight Riders’ team this season and not seeing the name of the West Indian all-rounder has been strange. Shakib Al Hasan of Bangladesh has appeared in all three games so far and has looked decent. KKR, missed Narine’s bowling menace, if not his batting, as they lost two of their three games in Chennai.

Eoin Morgan’s side will go head to head against Chennai Super Kings on Wednesday at the Wankhede Stadium, and before that Brendon McCullum hinted that Narine, who was “touch and go” for the game against RCB, may be available.

“Sunil Narine stood on the rope before our first game which means he has had an injury where he was not 100 per cent fit. He certainly comes into our calculations, he was touch and go for this game against RCB but we opted for Shakib who has been good for us and he gives us an extra bit of batting. After three games, the guys have played well, we have not got the results, we probably would need some fresh legs for slightly different wickets in Mumbai,” said Brendon McCullum.

Brendon McCullum praises Maxwell and de Villiers for their performance

AB de Villiers and Glenn Maxwell
AB de Villiers and Glenn Maxwell

McCullum also praised Maxwell and de Villiers, saying that both dashers eliminated the Chepauk surface from the scenario. Maxwell scored 78 off 49 balls and established an 86-run partnership with Devdutt Padikkal. Following the dismissal of the latter, Maxwell was joined by de Villiers, who took the KKR bowlers to cleaners.

“In the past, we have not been made to plan much as Maxwell has not been in top form but it appears, he has come this year with a really refreshed attitude. He is taking the game on, we have seen him being successful in the Big Bash and Australia. He took the game away from us in a crunch situation but if we had our time again, we would have tried few different things,” Brendon McCullum quoted. 

“There was some tremendous batting from Maxwell and ABD on the surface which was probably the best we have seen in Chennai, but it was still tricky at times but both these batsmen took the surface out of the equation,” he added.

In the first two overs, Varun Chakravarthy took two wickets to restrict RCB to 9/2. The spinner picked the wicket of Virat Kohli and Rajat Patidar in the powerplay. He was not continued after that over and as a result, several people criticised KKR management and skipper Eoin Morgan, stating that the spinner should have been bowled to Glenn Maxwell as well.

“Yeah, look, in hindsight if we had our time again we probably would have bowled Varun Chakravarthy in the next over when Maxwell had just come out to bat. But look we were trying to save Varun’s overs for AB de Villiers as well when he came to the crease. In retrospect, we should have bowled him for another over but there were many other aspects where we couldn’t just tidy up which would have given us a much better chance against a confident team like RCB.” stated Brendon McCullum. 

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