Unlike their opponents from the 2021 final, Kolkata Knight Riders, the runners-up, made an impressive start to 2022 Indian Premier League (IPL), avenging their defeat to Chennai Super Kings in the season opener to win three of their first four games. However, the Shreyas Iyer-led side have since stuttered to lose five matches in a row and now stand eighth in the points table with as many wins as ninth-placed CSK and with their campaign now hanging on a thread. And ahead of their match against Rajasthan Royals, former England captain Kevin Pietersen has slammed KKR’s “horrible state of affairs” and called their dressing room “negative”. (Follow IPL 2022 full coverage)
KKR have a new leader in Shreyas and the man who scripted their turnaround in the UAE last season, Venkatesh Iyer, yet their batting has collectively faltered. And so has their bowling with Umesh Yadav blowing cold after an impressive start to the season while Varun Chakravarthy no longer seems to have the mystery element to his bowling.
Writing on his<i> Betway.in</i> blog after KKR’s game against Delhi Capitals last Thursday, Pietersen admitted that the side has been as much as a disappointment as Mumbai Indians.
“I know that Mumbai Indians are having a shocker, but KKR are also in a dreadful way. They won three of their first four games and have totally lost it since then. They’ve used 19 players so far, which is far too many. For a franchise as big as them, it’s just a horrible state of affairs,” he wrote.
“That is a dressing room full of the opposite energy to Gujarat: negative, negative, negative. Last year, that run to the final was defined by out-of-the-box thinking. They had their analyst, Nathan Leamon, front and centre, sending signals out to the middle, and they seemed really innovative.
“Now it seems like the whole thing has run out of momentum. Along with Mumbai, they are my disappointments of the competition so far,” he added.
KKR still have a slim chance of making the playoffs provided they win five if their remaining games and other factors fall their way.
