KKR vs SRH IPL 2024 Final Playing XIs: Sunrisers Hyderabad drop Abdul Samad to bench for summit clash

Image Source : BCCI/IPL Pat Cummins and Mitchell Stark during the KKR vs SRH IPL 2024 final in Chennai on May 26, 2024

Pat Cummins won the crucial toss as Sunrisers Hyderabad won the crucial toss against Kolkata Knight Riders in the IPL 2024 final in Chennai on Sunday, May 26. KKR fielded the same playing eleven that beat SRH in the first Qualifier with Nitish Rana missing out again.

Despite batting first, Pat Cummins-led SRH named in-form spin all-rounder Shahbaz Ahmed in their playing eleven with Abdul Samad settling for the impact substitutes list. Samad is enjoying a good season in 2024 with 178 runs at a strike rate of 171.15 and might come to bat if the Sunrisers witness an early collapse.

"Looks like a good wicket, never good at reading wickets," Pat Cummins said after winning the toss. "But this looks fine. There was no dew the other night, doesn't seem there will be today, but who knows. We are playing a particular style, won't work every time but when it does, it will be damaging. Good to be back here. It is a different soil, but you are asking the wrong bloke. Shahbaz comes in for Samad."

Meanwhile, Shreyas Iyer made no changes to KKR's winning combination and said that every individual is taking responsibility this season.

"We would have bowled, we'll get a fair idea about how the pitch will play," Shreyas Iyer said. "It's a red soil and we played our last game on a similar surface. We need to stay with the present, stick to the basics and execute all our plans. Every individual is taking responsibility, this is a big game, we've plenty of people who're playing in a final for the first time, nervous, but this is also a good chance. We're going with the same team."

Kolkata Knight Riders Playing XI: Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), Sunil Narine, Venkatesh Iyer, Shreyas Iyer (c), Rinku Singh, Andre Russell, Ramandeep Singh, Mitchell Starc, Vaibhav Arora, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakaravarthy.