After claiming their second IPL title in 2014, KKR became one of the most successful IPL franchises. But, they haven’t been able to make their presence felt in the IPL since then. Such has been their performances in IPL after 2014 that they haven’t even come close to winning the trophy even once.
KKR built a new look team after the mega-auction for IPL 2022. Their fans expected them to show some resilience with new faces in their squad. But the Knight Riders failed miserably yet again and ended up losing 8 out of their 14 matches.
Consequently, they finished in the 7th position, and once more, KKR didn’t get to the playoffs. These repeated failures have made their management look for more changes this season. Here, we will tell you what the KKR team 2022 players list was and what the KKR 2023 squad will look like.
KKR Team 2022 Players List
KKR’s squad from IPL 2022 had some big names in it. The most prominent ones include Pat Cummins, Tim Southee, Alex Hales, Andre Rusell, Sunil Narine, Mohammad Nabi, and Shreyas Iyer. Despite having all these heavyweights, they couldn’t make a strong case for themselves.
Let’s take a look at the complete KKR team 2022 players list:
Shreyas Iyer (c), Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Venkatesh Iyer, Varun Chakravarthy, Nitish Rana, Pat Cummins, Shivam Mavi, Sheldon Jackson, Ajinkya Rahane, Rinku Singh, Anukul Roy, Rasikh Dar, Baba Indrajith, Chamika Karunaratne, Abhijeet Tomar, Pratham Singh, Ashok Sharma, Sam Billings, Alex Hales, Tim Southee, Ramesh Kumar, Mohammad Nabi, Umesh Yadav, Aman Khan
It was a 25-member squad including 7 foreign and 18 local cricketers.
KKR Retained Players for IPL 2023
In IPL 2022, none of the KKR bowlers could get his name among the top 10 wicket-takers. Also, no KKR batter featured in the list of the 15 highest run-scorers. Shreyas Iyer was their top run-getter while Andre Rusell bagged the most wickets for them. Many of their star players flopped during the entire season.
These poor individual performances have forced KKR to retain just 11 players from last season. The retained players are listed as follows:
Shreyas Iyer (c), Nitish Rana, Venkatesh Iyer, Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Umesh Yadav, Tim Southee, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakravarthy, Anukul Roy, Rinku Singh
KKR Released Players for IPL 2023
Australia’s star fast bowler Pat Cummins and England’s flamboyant batsman Sam Billings have pulled out of IPL 2023. The reason behind their withdrawal is a packed international schedule and the desire of focusing more on red-ball cricket. Including these two blokes, as many as 16 cricketers (including 3 traded-out players) were released from the KKR team 2022 players list.
Following is the list of 13 players (along with their last season’s pay) excluded from KKR’s squad:
| Player | IPL 2022 Salary (INR) |
| Pat Cummins | 7.25 crore |
| Shivam Mavi | 7.25 crore |
| Sam Billings | 2 crore |
| Alex Hales | 1.5 crore |
| Aaron Finch | 1.5 crore |
| Mohammad Nabi | 1 crore |
| Ajinkya Rahane | 1 crore |
| Chamika Karunaratne | 50 lakh |
| Abhijeet Tomar | 40 lakh |
| Sheldon Jackson | 20 lakh |
| Ramesh Kumar | 20 lakh |
| Rasikh Salam | 20 lakh |
| Pratham Singh | 20 lakh |
| Ashok Sharma | 20 lakh |
| Baba Indrajith | 20 lakh |
| Aman Khan | 20 lakh |
KKR spent a hefty amount of 23.8 crores on these 16 players last year. All these exclusions show management’s dissatisfaction with the teams’ efforts last year.
Players Traded by KKR Ahead of IPL 2023
KKR has made quite a few important moves in the trading window. They have acquired Shardul Thakur from Delhi Capitals in exchange for Aman Khan. Apart from Shardul, they have also roped in Afghanistan’s hard-hitting opener Rahmanullah Gurbaz. The third and last traded player that KKR got is New Zealand’s 150 kph pacer, Lockie Ferguson.
Final KKR 2023 Squad before the Auctions
Currently, KKR has got just 14 players in their squad. These 14 players include 11 retentions and 3 traded player signings.
Let’s take a look at KKR’s squad breakdown ahead of the IPL mini-auction.
Batsmen: Shreyas Iyer (c), Nitish Rana, and Rahmanullah Gurbaz
All-rounders: Venkatesh Iyer, Ankul Roy, Andre Russell, and Sunil Narine,
Bowlers: Shardul Thakur, Lockie Ferguson, Umesh Yadav, Tim Southee, Varun Chakravarthy, Harshit Rana, and Rinku Singh
KKR’s current team is studded with all-rounders but they have just 3 regular batters, which is not a great sign. Bowling looks decent with plenty of variety in both the spin and pace departments.
KKR Predicted Playing XI for IPL 2023
The Knight Riders will still be eyeing to buy at least 8 more cricketers from the auction. But, the current squad suggests that their initial playing XI may look like this:
- Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk)
- Nitish Rana
- Shreyas Iyer (c)
- ???
- ???
- Andre Russell
- Ankul Roy
- Sunil Narine
- Tim Southee/Lockie Ferguson
- Umesh Yadav
- Varun Chakravarthy
The top order and the bowling attack look sorted but there’s hardly a good option there for the middle order. So, that must be an area of concern for KKR right now.
Players KKR Will Target in the Mini-Auction
KKR have space for 3 more overseas players in their lineup. Also, they need around half a dozen local players to be added to their squad. Hence, they have to get quite a handful of players from the IPL 2023 auction.
The foremost requirement of the Knight Rider’s team combination is to have one or two solid middle-order batsmen. They can look for both local and overseas options in that regard. In addition, they will be eager to add more options in their pace battery, especially a left-arm fast bowler.
You may be surprised to know that KKR has the smallest purse amount for the auction. Despite releasing 13 players from the squad, they can only spend 7.05 crore INR on getting more players. It means that star cricketers like Sam Curran, Ben Stokes, and Cameron Green might be already out of their reach.
Considering all these odds, we have prepared a list of all the players who will interest KKR during the mini-auction. The list is as follows:
- Rassie van der Dussen
- Manish Pandey
- Mayank Agarwal
- Sandeep Sharma
- Sherfane Rutherford
- Reece Topley
- Karun Nair
- Ankit Rajpoot
- Robin Uthappa
- Basil Thampi
- Jaydev Unadkat
