A revamped Kings XI Punjab begin their season opener of VIVO IPL 2018 against the Delhi Daredevils. KXIP missed last season’s Playoffs by a whisker, while DD finished sixth in the eight-team table. The Delhi Daredevils have not progressed past the league stage in the last four seasons; their owners and supporters will be hoping this team, under Gautam Gambhir – who has previously led the Kolkata Knight Riders to two titles, can put an end to that streak and win some silverware.
Head to Head
Overall: Matches – 20, Kings XI Punjab won – 11, Delhi Daredevils won – 9
At the IS Bindra Stadium in Mohali: Matches – 5, Kings XI Punjab won – 4, Delhi Daredevils won – 1
Interesting Facts between the two teams
1. Ravichandran Ashwin has never before captained a team in Twenty20 cricket. His opposite number Gautam Gambhir is the second-most experienced captain in the IPL; he has been captain in a total of 123 matches.
2. Kings XI Punjab’s Mayank Agarwal scored an unprecedented 2232 runs in the recently concluded domestic cricket season in India.
3. If Chris Gayle makes the Kings XI Punjab playing XI, it would be the 23rd team he would have represented in T20s.
4. Delhi Daredevils’ Rishabh Pant was the joint-highest run-getter in this season’s domestic T20 competition; he scored 411 runs in 10 innings at a strike-rate of 195.71.
5. In 9 T20 Internationals so far this year, Colin Munro has scored a total of 396 runs at an average of 49.50 and at a strike-rate of 193.17.
Full Squad:
Delhi Daredevils: Gautam Gambhir (captain), Shreyas Iyer, Sandeep Lamichhane, Manjot Kalra, Glenn Maxwell, Amit Mishra, Mohammed Shami, Chris Morris, Colin Munro, Shahbaz Nadeem, Naman Ojha, Rishabh Pant, Harshal Patel, Jason Roy, Vijay Shankar, Prithvi Shaw, Rahul Tewatia, Jayant Yadav, Abhishek Sharma, Avesh Khan, Trent Boult, Daniel Christian, Sayan Ghosh, Gurkeerat Singh Mann.
Kings XI Punjab: Ravichandran Ashwin (captain), Yuvraj Singh, Mayank Agarwal, Mayank Dagar, Aaron Finch, Chris Gayle, Manzoor Dar, David Miller, Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Karun Nair, Axar Patel, Lokesh Rahul, Marcus Stoinis, Manoj Tiwary, Andrew Tye, Ben Dwarshuis, Ankit Rajpoot, Pardeep Sahu, Mohit Sharma, Barinder Sran, Akshdeep Nath.