IPL 2025: Rashid Khan, a worry than strength for Titans against Knights

A Kolkata Knight Riders versus Gujarat Titans match at the Eden Gardens, at the best of times, would have been billed as a spin battle between the Sunil Narine-Varun Chakravarthy duo and the dreaded Rashid Khan. However, the Afghan’s woeful form this season looks a worrying factor for Shubman Gill & co on the contrary as they landed in Kolkata as IPL 2025 table toppers.

 While the Titans chased down a 200-plus target against Delhi Capitals on their home turf in Ahmedabad on Friday, Rashid – arguably the most feared leg spinner in T20 format for a number of years now – failed to pose any questions of the rival batters. An analysis of 4-0-38-0 hardly does justice to Rashid’s reputation while he has picked up only four wickets from seven matches so far at an economy rate of 9.73.

 This has certainly put a lot of pressure on the frizzly haired Sai Kishore, the Tamil Nadu left-arm spinner who has scalped 11 wickets as the Titans bowlers have thankfully made up for Rashid’s loss of form so far. Pacemen Prasidh Krishna, now heading the Purple Cap race with 14 wickets, Mohammed Siraj and Kishore have accounted for 36 wickets between themselves but the team management desperately wants Rashid to return to form in the business-end of the tournament.

 In one of the seven matches, Rashid was not given his full quota of four overs – an unbelievable scenario for the 26-year-old who was named the ICC T20 Cricketer of the Decade few years back. An effervescent personality, Rashid has till date claimed 153 wickets since his IPL debut for Sunrisers Hyderabad since 2017 at an economy rate of 6.98.

 What is it that had been making Rashid, an enigma for batters till the other day with his mix of googlies and variations of speed, easier to pick in recent times? Ashis Kapoor, former India off spinner and the bowling coach of Titans, weighed in on the subject before the Capitals game: ‘’Rashid went through surgery because his back was hurting last year. Sometimes when you are in so much pain during matches, you tend to do certain things with your action so that it pains less. There have been a few things about which we spoke this year after 2–3 games where he needs to make a few adjustments with his front hand, which has been rather closed while it should be facing the batter. He is doing that now and bowling better lengths in the last two-three games.’’

 What added to Rashid’s misery on Saturday was that he not only went wicketless but burnt both of Titans’ reviews in the match, both against Delhi skipper Axar Patel. First, Rashid thought that he had trapped lbw in the 10th over but the ball clearly had pitched outside the leg stump. Rashid then took another review in the final ball of the 14th over when he thought that he had edged the batter down the leg side. The ball was nowhere close to the bat and had hit him on the pads while going into the gloves of the keeper.

  This could be a sign of frustration as the spinners need to play on the patience of the batters – and this is possibly the first phase of Rashid’s career when he is being attacked. However, the KKR batters – who cut a sorry figure against Yuzvendra Chahal, another practitioner of the same trade in the last game against Punjab Kings, cannot afford to rest easy against the smiling assassin.

 Catch the match

 Kolkata Knight Riders vs Gujarat Titans

 Eden Gardens, 7.30 pm IST