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| Kolkata Vs Delhi, IPL Qualifier 1 |
Two teams with matching firepower will come face to face when
table-toppers Delhi Daredevils take on second-placed Kolkata Knight
Riders in what promises to be a high-voltage first qualifier of the
controversy-ridden IPL on Tuesday.
In a season which has been
marred by unsavoury incidents off the field, the IPL's cricketing climax
promises to be quite a treat with heavyweights making the last four.
And
no better than Delhi and KKR to kick off the business end of the event
as the two teams have without doubt been the most consistent performers
in the Twenty20 league this season.
Both the teams boast of
explosive batting line-ups. Their bowling attacks have also done
exceptionally well in a format which is considered punishing for the
bowlers.
When the two teams came face to face in the league
stage, the honours were shared with Delhi triumphing in Kolkata and KKR
returning the favour when they visited the capital.
On paper, the
sides match up pretty well and it promises to be a battle of equals. If
Delhi has the brutality of captain Virender Sehwag and David Warner,
Kolkata have the answer in Brendon McCullum.
If Mahela
Jayawardena lends stability to Delhi's batting order, Kolkata captain
Gautam Gambhir has been equally inspirational for his team.
In
fact, both the teams have equally potent all-rounders in the line-up
with Irfan Pathan rediscovering his old form for Delhi and Bangladeshi
Shakib Al Hasan doing the job for Kolkata.
On the bowling front,
Delhi have a pace ace in South African Morne Morkel, who has not just
been miserly in conceding runs but has also been wrecker-in-chief when
it comes to picking up wickets.
Ably supported by Umesh Yadav and Varun Aaron, Delhi's pace attack has looked lethal with Morkel at the helm.
Kolkata
also have an intimidating pace battery with Australian Brett Lee likely
to make a comeback after sitting out in the last three games.
But
with the likes of mystery spinner Sunil Narine, Iqbal Abdulla and
Shakib in the rank, Kolkata will definitely have an upper hand over
Delhi in the spin department.
Kolkata have their own match-winning bowler in mystery spinner Narine, who has been consistency personified.
Delhi
Daredevils: Virender Sehwag (Capt), Kevin Pietersen, Mahela
Jayawardena, Ajit Agarkar, Irfan Pathan, Umesh Yadav, Puneet Bisht,
Robin Bist, Naman Ojha (wk), Shahbaz Nadeem, Venugopal Rao, Vikas
Mishra, Yogesh Nagar, Zafir Patel, Sunny Gupta, Tejashwi Yadav,
Aavishkar Salvi, Kuldeep Raval, Manpreet Juneja, Pawan Negi, Prashant
Naik, Aaron Finch, Andre Russell, Doug Bracewell, Glenn Maxwell, Gulam
Bodi, Morne Morkel, Roelf van der Merwe.
Kolkata Knight Riders:
Gautam Gambhir (c), Brendon McCullum (wk), Jacques Kallis, Manoj Tiwary,
Yusuf Pathan, Debabrata Das, Laxmi Ratan Shukla, Rajat Bhatia, Sunil
Narine, Brett Lee, Iqbal Abdulla, Chirag Jani, Iresh Saxena, Jaidev
Unadkat, Manvinder Bisla, Pradeep Sangwan, Sanju Samson, Sarabjit Singh
Ladda, Mohammad Shami Ahmed, Eoin Morgan, Marchant de Lange, Ryan ten
Doeschate and Shakib Al Hasan.
PWI159/5(20) 
CSK135/8(20)
Player of the match : S Smith 
