Sharjah: Royal Challengers Bangalore captain Virat Kohli has won the toss and elected to bat first against Kolkata Knight Riders in the IPL 2021 Eliminator at the Sharjah Cricket Stadium here Monday. Both Kohli and Kolkata skipper Eoin Morgan confirmed no changes to their respective playing elevens.
After winning the toss, Kohli said, “Looks like a great wicket, nice and hard. It gets tougher to bat here in Sharjah as the game progresses. No changes. A youngster steps up and wins you a game against a top side like Delhi. Very happy for KS. This is what this tournament is all about. Meetings have been pretty short and sharp. We have the ability to win games, nothing changes this being an Eliminator.”
Morgan said, “We would have loved to bowl first anyways. The toss doesn’t bother us. We are feeling confident within the group and guys are starting to establish themselves in their roles. We are starting to come good as a team.”
Playing XIs:
Royal Challengers Bangalore: Virat Kohli (captain), Devdutt Padikkal, KS Bharat (wicketkeeper), Daniel Christian, Glenn Maxwell, AB de Villiers, Shahbaz Ahmed, Harshal Patel, George Garton and Mohammed Siraj, Yuzvendra Chahal.
Kolkata Knight Riders: Shubman Gill, Venkatesh Iyer, Nitish Rana, Rahul Tripathi, Eoin Morgan (captain), Dinesh Karthik (wicketkeeper), Shakib Al Hasan, Sunil Narine, Lockie Ferguson, Shivam Mavi and Varun Chakaravarthy