Kolkata Knight Riders have their task cut out following the seven-wicket loss to Gujarat Titans at Eden Gardens on Saturday. They need to win all of their remaining five games in order to qualify for the playoffs.
That’s certainly a very stiff ask, considering how the Knights have been playing lately and on top of that, the uncertainty of the shortest format, which is a big factor.
However, they are drawing inspiration from the 2021 season when, under the leadership of Eoin Morgan, they turned it around from a similarly tough situation and won all their remaining league matches as well as the ones in the playoffs to make the final.
“We are not far away. Sometimes cricket is a fine line between success and failure.
“At the moment, we have just been on the wrong side of that. We still have a few more games coming up. So we still have an opportunity to bounce back strong,” the Knight Riders assistant coach James Foster said on the sidelines of Knight Golf at the RCGC on Sunday.
“We have done that a couple of seasons back. We were on a roll then and that’s what we are looking to do now.”
Regular captain Shreyas Iyer’s absence did leave a void in their batting line-up. An unstable top order and overall inconsistency in batting worsened matters for the Knights.
The Knights, though, believe those players who are yet to contribute will make sure to step up in the games ahead. “Playing without Shreyas is a huge loss for us and would be so for any IPL side. We have had a rejig a little bit later.
“We’ve actually played some wonderful cricket at times in this campaign. Pretty much in every game, we have been in with a chance. In every innings, there have been some standout performances from the KKR perspective. But you probably just need two or three other players to have almost as many performances to back that up,” Foster emphasised.
“We have been working very hard. The thrust we are going in with is bang on and the players are also working exceptionally hard.”
The Knights would hope Roy recovers from his back niggle and returns to the XI as early as possible, while all-rounder Shardul Thakur again wasn’t given even an over on Saturday. “Shardul is just coming back from a bit of a niggle. That’s the reason why he has not been playing (in a few games). He’s almost there from the fitness point of view,” Foster stated.