IPL 2025: Eden Gardens ‘drowns’ KKR, Focus now switches to King Kohli and RCB at the Kotla

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Damn these rains. Whatever sanguine hopes Kolkata Knight Riders still have of making it to the Playoffs in the IPL 2025 were washed out on Saturday night at the Eden Gardens. This was an important match for KKR to win at home against the unstoppable-looking Punjab Kings.

In the end, points split means Punjab Kings have 11 points from nine matches and can still hope to race ahead into the last four while KKR need to win 5/5. It requires a miracle of sorts to happen, but the way Ajinkya Rahane's side has played this season, it doesn't seem on the cards.

Punjab Kings are indeed doing the right things so regularly, even in away matches the boys look so mature. It seems, even tyros Priyansh Aranya and Prabhsimran Singh, as openers, look like seasoned pros.

They showed authority and maturity while taking on the KKR attack. Priyansh is now well-known in cricketing circles for what he had done in the Delhi Premier League, smashing six sixes in one over last year.

To see 24-year-old Priyansh, a southpaw, get his eye in, dig heels on the hallowed Eden turf and connect bat and ball with sweet timing looked attractive. More than brute raw power, his game looks nuanced while handling the KKR pace pack comprising Vaibhav Arora, Chetan Sakariya and Harshit Rana.

For those who understand the importance of a solid partnership at the top in cricket, whatever be the format, Priyansh and Prabhsimran Singh looked the ideal couple in the middle.

The left/right combination helps in unsettling the bowlers as well as creates problems for the fielding side captain (Rahane) to set a field. This has been quite a trend in the IPL 2025.

Yet, for Punjab Kings to find in two uncapped players, Priyansh and Prabhismran, a pair which jammed up well in Power Play and flog the KKR bowlers was stimulating to watch. To have watched this duo plunder 120 runs in 11.5 overs, KKR and their fans looked worried.

When a side puts on such a solid show, it becomes easier for the remainder of the batting order to bat with more freedom. For those who had predicted scores in excess of 250 will come in one innings, no way. The 201 for 4 in which Punjab Kings came up with was a decent score. Then came the rains. It left KKR in tears as the misery continues.

It was hot and humid, almost to the point of draining the players. But then, players have become super fit in the IPL and even if they are drenched in sweat, they have to play. Jamaican Andre Russell was steaming in to bowl and his head was shining in sweat and streaming down his skin. The effort to bowl in such conditions is not easy at all.

And then came the rains, almost unannounced, to spoil the night for KKR. This is where the Cricket Association of Bengal has messed up. One has seen at a venue like the Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru, despite heavy rains, the system in place to resume play so fast is magical.

The Subair drainage system installed by the Karnataka State Cricket Association in 2017 makes it a marvellous stadium, not just in India, but the world. More cites needed to learn, Kolkata included. No, what goes on in the Cricket Association of Bengal is still living in a Colonial legacy.

Yes, the Eden Garden is historic but at the end of 2025, it can be refereed to as a grave for KKR after the IPL. First, there was rancour over the pitch being prepared by curator Sujan Mukherjee.

Maybe, the Ganguly gang which runs CAB, headed by Snehasish, brother of Sourav Ganguly can curse themselves for poor planning and not spending on infrastructure. Minus the Subair drainage system, this venue is doomed. Or drowned!

All Eyes on Kohli at the Kotla!

Moving on to Super Sunday, with a double-header in store, focus will be on King Kohli and how he has ensured RCB are working hard this time. Taking on a new-look and inspired Delhi Capitals at the Ferozeshah Kotla in New Delhi will be a joy.

Ticket prices at this venue have shot up crazily and even West stand lower tier tickets cost a bomb. Above all, the heat in the capital will test the players every which possible way, dry and parchy.

Well, people are ready to pay a price for Kohli, a Delhi boy who never played for Delhi in the IPL. After all, when the IPL began in 2008, Virat Kohli was taken up by RCB after Virender Sehwag and a few more batters went into a side which was called Delhi Daredevils first.

Rechristened as the Delhi Capitals, there was just no chance they could tempt or bait Kohli, get him back. The kind of fierce loyalty he has shown to RCB matches his commitment to Indian cricket.

No rhetoric, Kohli's ethos and pathos as far as the IPL goes is connected with his romance at RCB. He has been there since inception of the IPL and will never move out from there. It is a passionate love affair, an interlude, none dare interrupt it. Was it Delhi's loss he never played for his home city in the IPL?

Well, just as MS Dhoni is treated as Thala by CSK, King Kohli is a Bengaluru rock star. For Delhi fans, a glimpse of Kohli has become a joy as witnessed by fan turnout at the Kotla venue over the last two days.