IPL 2025: Delhi Capitals hope Kotla pitch isn’t slow turner against KKR

Call the correction a side-effect of the reversal of the ban on using saliva on the ball, allowing crucial reverse swing at the death, and a general variety in the kind of wickets that most IPL grounds have seen this year. But so far, games at the Kotla are shedding the tag of being all-out run fests.

In particular, Sunday’s slower, dry surface where the ball got stuck in led to a low-scoring affair in which batting was only made easy once dew set in for the chasing side. Despite having a pair of elite Indian spinners though, DC mentor Kevin Pietersen would like for a different kind of playing surface for their match against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) on Tuesday.

“It (the pitch) depends on the opposition,” he said after the defeat to RCB about DC’s struggles to win in New Delhi. “With the kind of players and the kind of team that Bengaluru are, this was probably a better wicket to play against them, whereas against KKR on Tuesday, I hope it’s not the wicket we had tonight.”

With home comforts hard to buy for DC this season – they have lost two of the three games in the capital, and their only win was via Super Over courtesy some heroics from Mitchell Starc – Pietersen’s apprehensions about a slower wicket stand to reason. Their batters have shown a struggle to accelerate in the middle overs and build partnerships once spinners come into play in each of the three games.

And the upcoming opposition can make them pay. Despite KKR’s faltering season – the defending champions languishing in seventh place with just three wins in nine – Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarthy, have been in form, taking seven and 11 wickets respectively and staying miser in the runs they concede. The two were seen in an hour-long training session on the eve of the game, and if the conditions play similarly to Sunday, they will be crucial for KKR.

In that case, a curious battle of spin – Axar, Kuldeep vs Narine, Chakravarthy – may hold the key in the battle for DC to turn around their home form.

Local boy and KKR speedster Harshit Rana is quite sure about how the wicket will behave. “Expectations (from the pitch) are the same. Bounce usually remains low at Kotla. The slower one was gripping the surface (in Sunday’s game) and the RCB bowlers made good use of that,” he said at the pre-match press conference here on Monday.

A larger debate may occur about whether or not slow conditions are conducive to the entertainment that this tournament wants to create at all costs. Pietersen feels it’s good for the game in general. “Is it good to see the bowlers being served up into the stands like last year? Do people want to see that every night? I know I don’t. I don’t think it’s a bad thing (to have slow pitches at times),” he said. Just not for Tuesday’s game, he wished with a grin.