KKR vs SRH, IPL 2025 Highlights: KKR bowlers decimate SRH batting, complete dominant 80-run victory

KKR vs SRH, IPL 2025 Highlights: Harshit Rana celebrates a wicket at the Eden Gardens

KKR vs SRH, IPL 2025 Highlights: One thing that the IPL keeps proving year on year is that you can never say with any certainty what to expect. After a mega-auction that allowed teams to retain more than half of their squads from last year, expectations were that the stronger teams would remain strong as their core stayed in place. Instead, as Sunrisers Hyderabad and Kolkata Knight Riders head into a rematch of last year’s final, the two strongest teams from 2024, they find themselves rooted at the very bottom of the 2025 table.

Defending champions KKR enter this match at the Eden Gardens at the very bottom, with one win in three games. Their last match was a devastating loss to the then-winless Mumbai Indians, which saw their batting crumble and bow out for 116 all-out. It was called a ‘collective batting failure’ by new captain Ajinkya Rahane, which is not words any team wants to be hearing three matches into a title defence — but that is certainly what it was. Their pair of heavy losses to MI and RCB mean that, despite a comfy win against RR, they sit with a run-rate of negative 1.428. Another loss here could mean the champions play catch-up the rest of the way.

It’s a similar story for SRH, who were trounced inside 16 overs of DC’s chase in Vizag for a heavy loss of their own. It was a meek batting performance, rescued by young Aniket Verma’s gem to provide a respectable total — but the warning signs are there. Abhishek Sharma and Travis Head don’t look infallible in the powerplay, we haven’t seen the best of Heinrich Klaasen, and the bowling has flattered to deceive in each of their three matches. The bones of that superteam are still there, and SRH know they are capable of going on a run and racking up huge scores. It just remains a question of when they are able to find that vein of form.

Both these teams will know that it’s not quite panic stations, less than a quarter of the way into the season. Many teams have looked very unconvincing so far as they try to get the combinations right, and that means there is an opportunity to tinker and figure out what is working and what is not. While the Eden Gardens has been in the eye of the storm when it comes to IPL teams recently seemingly feuding with curators at their home grounds, what it does always promise is an even playing surface for bat and ball. It becomes about application and the ability to play good cricket on the day, and both these teams will be well aware of the other’s capability to do that.

The last two times these teams played, it produced undramatic, straightforward wins for KKR, as they waltzed through the playoffs to the trophies. With the pressure on now as it was then, can SRH find their feet against a unit that has been their biggest nemesis? And which team will find themselves struggling at the foot of the table when the dust settles?