In a surprise move, Kings XI Punjab’s regular captain Shikhar Dhawan did not take part in the match against Rajasthan Royals at Mullanpur in Chandigarh on Saturday. Star PBKS all-rounder Sam Curran is the one who joins RR’s Sanju Samson in the absence of Dhawan. The toss went in favor of RR and the side elected to bowl first. Later, Kuran revealed the reason for Dhawan’s absence.

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Curran, speaking after the toss, revealed that Dhawan was out due to a minor injury.

“Shikhar (Dhawan) spotted a little problem and that’s why I’m here,” Curran said.

“We would have bowled first as well but now we have to put runs on the board. The balance is good and we hope to win a few more games but the middle order looks good, especially Shashank (Singh) and Ah We have exciting players and plenty of quality in Shubtosh (Sharma) tonight and (Liam) Livingstone is back too.”

At Rajasthan Royals, Jos Buttler and Ravichandran Ashwin missed, captain Sanju Samson told him at the toss.

After winning the toss, Samson said: “We bowled first, it looked like a good wicket, bowled first. We set a target, didn’t think about the target, focused on the process, worked on building the team, and we had a lot out there too Challenge, we had a lot of players out tonight, 90% of the game was good – Jos (Buttler) wasn’t 100%, Ash (R Ashwin) bhai was in trouble, so Rove. Mann (Powell) and (Tanush) Kotian came into the eleven.”

Tossing updates

Rajasthan Royals won the toss and chose to bowl to Kings XI Punjab.

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The following is the lineup of both sides——

Rajasthan Royals (Starting XI): Sanju Samson (w/c), Riyan Parag, Dhruv Jurel, Shimron Hetmyer, Rovman Powell, Tanush Kotian, Keshav Maharaj, Trent Boult, Avesh Khan, Kuldeep Sen, Yuzvendra Chahal

Kings XI Punjab (Starting XI): Jonny Bairstow, Atharva Thede, Prabhusimran Singh, Sam Curran (centre), Liam Livingstone, Jitesh Sharma (female), Shashank Singh, Harpreet Brar, Harshal Patel, Arshdeep Singh, Kagiso Rabada.