Punjab Kings are travelling to Guwahati in what is Rajasthan Royals’ first ‘home’ game of the IPL 2023 of Wednesday. Both PBKS and RR are notched up impressive wins in their first matches of the season and will look to continue their winning run in season. The South African cricketers have already started arriving in IPL 2023 with a couple of them making their first appearance in the Delhi Capitals vs Gujarat Titans clash on Tuesday night.
Shikhar Dhawan’s PBKS will also be boosted by a South African entry with pacer Kagiso Rabada ready to join the squad for IPL 2023. Rabada was one of he stars of the PBKS campaign in IPL 2022, claiming 23 wickets in 13 matches at an average of just 17.65. Overall he is one wicket short of 100 scalps in IPL from just 63 matches.
The South African will make for formidable new-ball attack with Arshdeep Singh especially with pace friendly conditions in Guwahati on Wednesday evening.
However, PBKS will continue to miss the services of big-hitting England all-rounder Liam Livingstone, who is yet to get his fitness certificate from ECB and yet to arrive in India also. With Rabada returning to the side, in all likelihood he will slip into the side to replace Nathan Ellis while Sam Curran, Sikandar Raza and Bhanuka Rajapaksa will continue to hold their places.
Sanju Samson’s RR are likely to go in with more or less the same playing 11 which powered them to 72-run win over Sunrisers Hyderabad in their opening match. West Indies pacer Obed McCoy is yet to recover from injury for the Royals.
Jos Buttler, Shimron Hetmyer, Jason Holder and Trent Boult will be the four foreign players for the IPL 2022 finalists. The Royals pace attack looks thin on paper as compared to the Punjab Kings but the spin duo of R Ashwin and Yuzvendra Chahal are in top form.
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Rajasthan Royals: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Jos Buttler, Sanju Samson (c, wk), Devdutt Padikkal, Shimron Hetmyer, Riyan Parag, Jason Holder, R Ashwin, Trent Boult, KM Asif, Yuzvendra Chahal
Punjab Kings: Prabhsimran Singh, Shikhar Dhawan (c), Bhanuka Rajapaksa, Jitesh Sharma (wk), Sikandar Raza, Sam Curran, M Shahrukh Khan, Harpreet Brar, Rahul Chahar, Arshdeep Singh, Kagiso Rabada
