KKR bowlers face tough job against RCB batting line-up

A demoralising defeat in their own den will certainly serve as a wake-up call for the Kolkata Knight Riders bowlers as they take on a menacing

Royal Challengers Bangalore batting line-up in an Indian Premier League encounter, here on Sunday.

On a batting beauty at the Eden Gardens, KKR will face the onerous task of stopping a back-in form Chris Gayle and the ever dangerous

Virat Kohli.

Having started off with four wins in five matches, Kolkata Knight Riders wilted against Suresh Raina's assualt to lose their first match at

home on Friday night as they brace for a bigger challenger when they face the resurgent RCB, in a second match in three days.

For a team that has shown super consistency in both batting and bowling, the timing of the loss will be hurting

for the Gautam Gambhir's men.

It has come at a time when most of the teams, including the bottom-placed Gujarat Lions, have begun to

look up while for KKR the slide has begun, having slipped to second place in the crucial mid-phase of the eight-team league.Struggling to find their rhythm, the star-studded Kohli brigade have finally found their expression right with the familiar mayhem of Chris Gayle.Reunited with Kohli at the opening spot, Gayle cantered to 77 off 38 balls, his first halfcentury in 17 matches and went on to become the only batsman to scale Mt 10,000 in the T20 format.

"We all love Chris Gayle's batting, don't we? Personally, I love the entire package of this man-mountain.

He is a delight for marketing men, broadcasters, and of course us, the lesser mortals, his fans who were not surprised that he reached 10000 runs in this format.

Gayle and Kohli put together 122 runs in 76 balls, in an ominous sign for the KKR camp as Gambhir have admitted to have been reeling under the effect.

The Shakib-Al-Hasan formula did not work for Gambhir against the Lions as he conceded at 10.33 as the skipper may resort to his trusted pace spearhead

of Trent Boult to tackle the Gayle-effect.