IPL 2023, Match 2, Punjab Kings vs Kolkata Knight Riders - Rain likely to play a spoilsport? Get latest update

In the first of the two matches on Saturday, Punjab Kings will open their IPL 2023 campaign against the former two-time winners Kolkata Knight Riders in Mohali. The weather, however, is likely to play a spoilsport as thunderstorms are expected to halt the proceedings for the afternoon game. With untimely rains making headlines in north India lately, game 2 of this season could suffer the adverse fate of getting washed out too.

Weather report and Head-to-Head record

While the probability of precipitation is as high as 78%, the chances of thunderstorms are close to 50%. Both fans and players will pray to the rain Gods to stay away from this exciting clash as Mohali gear up to host the first IPL game since 2019.

Meanwhile, if the match goes ahead, KKR will have an upper hand going by the head-to-head record against Punjab. Over the past 15 years, both teams have faced each other in 30 matches, where Kolkata came on the top on 20 occasions while Punjab won just ten games. Even in the last season, Kolkata beat them by six wickets.

Team combinations and squads -

Both teams will have a new captain-coach combination at their disposal. While for the away side (KKR), an injury to regular skipper Shreyas Iyer resulted in the last-minute change in the leadership group, whereas out-of-favour India opener Shikhar Dhawan will captain the Punjab side following the release of the opener and last year’s skipper Mayank Agarwal.

The inclusion of two overseas all-rounders, Sam Curran and Sikandar Raza, will boost the franchise’s confidence; PBKS will surely miss three of their star players, injured and out for the whole season Jonny Bairstow alongside Liam Livingstone and South African seamer Kagiso Rabada. Kolkata, on the other hand, will also miss Bangladesh duo of Shakib Al Hasan and Litton Das due to national commitments.

Considering the surface in Mohali has a history of providing the right balance between bat and ball, it will be exciting to see how both teams fare in this new season.

The first of the double header begins at 3:30 PM IST.

Here are the squads of both teams –

Punjab Kings Squad -Shikhar Dhawan(c), Matthew Short, Harpreet Singh Bhatia, Bhanuka Rajapaksa, Shahrukh Khan, Prabhsimran Singh(w), Sikandar Raza, Sam Curran, Rishi Dhawan, Harpreet Brar, Rahul Chahar, Arshdeep Singh, Raj Bawa, Nathan Ellis, Baltej Singh, Jitesh Sharma, Atharva Taide, Vidhwath Kaverappa, Mohit Rathee, Shivam Singh

Kolkata Knight Riders Squad -Venkatesh Iyer, Rahmanullah Gurbaz(w), Nitish Rana(c), Rinku Singh, N Jagadeesan, Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Shardul Thakur, Lockie Ferguson, Varun Chakaravarthy, Umesh Yadav, David Wiese, Mandeep Singh, Anukul Roy, Kulwant Khejroliya, Vaibhav Arora, Harshit Rana, Suyash Sharma