IPL 2018 | KXIP owner supports Ravichandran Ashwin’s inclusion as skipper

A couple of weeks has been left for the start of the 11th season of the cash-rich league and before that, every team is working hard to make a strong start to the tournament. The Punjab-based franchise, who will be vying to reach the qualifiers of the tournament for the first time since 2014, didn’t want to leave any stone unturned. For this season, the team will be led by Ashwin who was bought at the auctions in Bangalore for INR 7.8 crore. Punjab will be the only team in the season to have a bowler as the skipper and the team owner believes that in this season, the team is going to deliver a good performance.

“(There are) A few nerves, yes, but I am looking forward to what should be an exciting season. (Brad) Hodge and (Virender) Sehwag have made a consensual decision (on Ashwin as captain) and I totally agree with it. I feel this year you’re going to see one of our best performances ever,” Burman told Cricketnext.

Because of the construction work in the city’s airport, the team now has been forced to play most of their home matches in Indore and the owner stated that he expected good crowd at the venue.

“The crowd turnout is not a problem at all, because it is such a long tournament it involves so many matches, sometimes it becomes difficult to keep the momentum and the enthusiasm going. That’s why we will be playing some of our home games in Indore. Also, this has been done keeping in mind BCCI’s policy of taking the game to different parts of the country,” Burman said.

The franchise never won the IPL so far and for this season they included Chris Gayle, Karun Nair, KL Rahul, Aaron Finch, Yuvraj Singh, and Mayank Agarwal. Burman revealed the mindset behind picking their current squad during the IPL auction.

“Earlier we were a bit light in this department (Indian players) and were clever thinkers in terms of spending the money. But our buying strategy has changed to include more stars as well as include the youngsters and give the best possible XI to the coaches so that we can win the tournament,” he said.

The T20 tournament will start on April 7 with the match between Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai. Punjab will play their first match of the season against Delhi Daredevils on April 8 at Feroz Shah Kotla stadium in New Delhi.