RCB vs KKR Match Preview- IPL 2024, Match 10

The RCB vs KKR IPL 2024 match will be played at the Chinnaswamy on March 29. This is the second straight home game for the Royal Challengers Bengaluru. RCB are heading into this game after their win over the Punjab Kings. KKR, on the other hand, won their first game against SRH at home. 

Date and Venue

The RCB vs KKR IPL 2024 match will be played at the Chinnaswamy stadium on March 29, Monday. The match starts at 7.30 pm IST. The two teams have played some close contests over the years in the IPL. The Knight Riders are ahead in the head-to-head count by 18-14.

RCB vs KKR Match Preview- IPL 2024, Match 10

Royal Challengers Bengaluru

After their win against Punjab Kings on Tuesday, the RCB side will be pumped up. Everything fell into place for the side as they bowled well and batted clinically to win the game. The game did get a bit close in the end but Dinesh Karthik and Mahipal Lomror aced the chase. Against KKR, they have their work cut out. They will have to negate the threat of the spin trio. They have Kohli, DK Faf du Plessis, and Glenn Maxwell four big names to pose a threat. 

Their bowlers did a great job against the Punjab Kings as they did not concede over 200 runs. The spinners limited the run scoring allowing the pacers to pick up the wickets. With the crowd backing them and their players in good form, RCB can pose a challenge to KKR. 

RCB Squad 

Faf du Plessis (c), Glenn Maxwell, Virat Kohli, Rajat Patidar, Anuj Rawat, Dinesh Karthik, Suyash Prabhudessai, Will Jacks, Mahipal Lomror, Karn Sharma, Manoj Bhandage, Mayank Dagar, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Akash Deep, Mohammed Siraj, Reece Topley, Himanshu Sharma, Rajan Kumar, Cameron Green, Alzarri Joseph, Yash Dayal, Tom Curran, Lockie Ferguson, Swapnil Singh, Saurav Chauhan. 

Kolkata Knight Riders 

The Knight Riders will consider themselves lucky to win their first game against SRH. Their batters gave their bowlers enough runs to defend but they almost lost them the game. Harshit Rana kept his cool in the end and helped the Knight Riders prevail in the end. KKR needs to do better across departments in the next game. Their openers did not give them a good start, they had a few catches dropped and their pacers leaked runs. 

The biggest challenge for Gautam Gambhir as KKR’e mentor will be to put an end to KKR’s opening woes. Since the last two seasons, the franchise has used 12 different batting combinations at the top. They have lost far too many wickets inside the powerplay, close to 60. He will also need to bring the best out of Mitchell Starc who will be under pressure to deliver. The KKR spin trio needs to be consistent and Shreyas Iyer at three needs to score runs. 

KKR Squad 

Shreyas Iyer (c), Nitish Rana, Rinku Singh, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Jason Roy, Sunil Narine, Suyash Sharma, Anukul Roy, Andre Russell, Venkatesh Iyer, Harshit Rana, Vaibhav Arora, Varun Chakaravarthy, KS Bharat, Chetan Sakariya, Mitchell Starc, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Ramandeep Singh, Sherfane Rutherford, Manish Pandey, Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Gus Atkinson, Sakib Hussain. 

Key Battles

Virat Kohli vs Mitchell Starc 

This will be the most anticipated battle fans will look forward to in this game. Both have been stellar performers at the international level and will look to outdo each other. STarc has dismissed Kohli four times in Test cricket and once in ODIs. He is yet to dismiss him in T20 cricket. However, Starc has not conceded too many runs. 

Rinku Singh vs Yash Dayal 

The two will come face to face once again after the epic IPL 2023 game. Yash Dayal recently spoke about how he was trolled on social media after theta game and will have his chance to dismiss Rinku again. 

Dinesh Karthik vs Harshit Rana 

DK is RCB’s designated finisher. Meanwhile, KKR will back Harshit Rana to deliver once again if the situation arises and he might have to come up with Karthik who has aced the finisher’s role in recent times. 

Key Players

For KKR, Phil Salt, Shreyas Iyer, Rinku Singh, and Andre Russell will be the key with the bat. With the ball, all eyes will be on Mitchell Starc and the spin troika of Narine, Chakravarthy, and Suyash Sharma. 

For RCB, Virat Kohli, Faf du Plessis, Glenn Maxwell, and Dinesh Karthik will be the key batters. With the ball, Mohd Siraj, Yash Dayal, and the left-arm pace of Reece Topley will be key. RCB might bring him in against KKR. They might also bring in Karn Sharma.

Weather and Pitch

 The Chinnaswamy track for the RCB vs KKR match is expected to be a high-scoring pitch as is the norm. Bowlers from both teams will be under pressure of leaking runs. It will be about limiting the damage. The Chinnaswamy stadium has seen the most sixes hit in the IPL and thus the bowlers will need to be on their toes. 

Talking about the Bengaluru weather, the temperatures will be around 40 degrees during the day, and in the evening it will drop down to 26 degrees with clear weather conditions. There has not been too much rain off late in Bengaluru. Meanwhile, the impact of dw on the match will be an interesting observation. 

Conclusion

 This is a very crucial game for both teams more so for KKR as they will be on the road for the next few games and winning away from home has been their challenge in the last few seasons.