Good News for KKR fans! Australian Test skipper Pat Cummins has joined the Kolkata Knight Riders after completing his mandatory quarantine. He will be available to play for the franchise from April 6 onwards.
However, Cricket Australia's No Objection (NOC) Certificate restricts him to play before April 6 as the management locked its players until April 5 due to Australia's ongoing tour of Pakistan.
Test skipper Pat Cummins, who captained Australia to a historic win in the Test series against Pakistan, returned home and caught up with his family before departing for India for a cash-rich tournament. However, few senior players in the squad made themselves unavailable for the white ball series vs Pakistan.
Notably, Australian player Cummins was the most expensive player at the IPL 2020 Mega Auction. IPL franchise Kolkata Knight Riders signed him for a whopping Rs 15.50 crore. Kolkata retained him for the same amount in 2021 as well. He scored 229 runs and scalped 21 wickets for KKR across the two seasons.
Despite his decent performances in IPL 2020 and 2021, KKR did not retain him ahead of the fifteenth edition of IPL but bought him back for INR 7.25 crore. However, Kolkata Knight Riders have played two games in IPL 2022 so far, registering a win vs CSK and a loss vs RCB.
Hence, KKR will play against the Mumbai Indians on April 6 in Pune. It will be quite more interesting to see if Pat Cummins has a role to play in that match.
KKR Squad:
Kolkata Knight Riders
Shreyas Iyer (captain), Pat Cummins, Andre Russell, Varun Chakravarthy, Venkatesh Iyer, Sunil Narine, Nitish Rana, Shivam Mavi, Sheldon Jackson, Ajinkya Rahane, Rinku Singh, Anukul Roy, Rasikh Dar, B Indrajith, Abhijeet Tomar, Pratham Singh, Ashok Sharma, Sam Billings, Aaron Finch, Ramesh Kumar, Mohammad Nabi, Umesh Yadav, Aman Khan, Andre Russell, Varun Chakravarthy, Venkatesh Iyer, Sunil Narine