Kolkata vs. Chennai, IPL 2014: Date, Time, Live Stream, TV Info and Preview

Kolkata Knight Riders' push for the play-offs continues with one of their toughest tasks as the Chennai Super Kings come to town. 

Venue: Eden Gardens, Kolkata

Date: Tuesday, May 20

Time: 3:30 p.m. BST, 8 p.m. local time

Live on: Sony Six, Star Sports HD, Star Sports 1 (India), ITV4 (United Kingdom), SuperSport (South Africa), OSN (UAE), SkyTV (New Zealand), Network Ten (Australia), Channel 9 (Bangladesh), Sportsnet and Omni (Canada), Sports Max (West Indies), Geo Super (Pakistan) and Starhub (Singapore). 

Weather: Kolkata is sweltering at the moment, with temperatures set to peak at 43 degrees Celsius, according to Yahoo! weather. While it should come down by the evening start, temperatures in excess of 30 degrees Celsius are possible.

Overview

Chennai Super Kings and Kolkata Knight Riders are both former IPL winners, and as the season enters its final stretch, both sides have an eye on the play-offs and finals week.

MS Dhoni's Super Kings will be in the top four—but while Kolkata currently occupy fourth place, they are under pressure to hold on to the slot.

Earlier in the day, Royal Bangalore Challengers could move level with the Knight Riders on points with victory over Sunrisers Hyderabad.

Form is on the home team's side, however—they have won four matches in a row, while their opponents were left in a spin by a slow-paced assault from RCB in Ranchi in their last outing.

KKR have found chasing their most effective method so far, so if Gautam Gambhir wins the toss, he might well bat second regardless of the Eden Gardens wicket.

With Sunil Narine, Piyush Chawla and Shakib Al Hasan in his bowling line-up, he has three very different but wily spinners in his arsenal, and it could see the Chennai batsmen, accomplished as they are, second-guess themselves as they look to set a target.

That said, it is rash to bet against CSK, who aside from their surprise lost in their last fixture have only lost to the table-topping Kings XI this season.

Key to the match will be the CSK innings—Chennai's batting has been their stronger suit, and the Knight Riders' bowling has set up several victories. Whoever gets the upper hand there will consider themselves favourites for the match.

Key Players

Kolkata Knight Riders 

Narine's performance is almost a given in the IPL these days, while Chawla and Al Hasan have also delivered impressive consistency with the ball. If South African paceman Morne Morkel, who has blown hot and cold all tournament, can turn in a hostile and accurate four overs, the chances of Chennai getting on top on the scorecard will be slim.

Chennai Super Kings

All eyes will be on Brendon McCullum after his recent revelations about a spot-fixing approach. He has plenty of runs to his name in IPL 7, as well as a strong opening partnership with Dwayne Smith, but the well has run dry in his last few outings. A big score would be timely.

Squads

Kolkata Knight Riders

G Gambhir*, MS Bisla†, PP Chawla, PJ Cummins, DB Das, JH Kallis, Kuldeep Yadav, CA Lynn, SS Mondal, M Morkel, SP Narine, MK Pandey, YK Pathan, V Pratap Singh, AD Russell, Shakib Al Hasan, RN ten Doeschate, RV Uthappa†, R Vinay Kumar, SA Yadav, UT Yadav

Chennai Super Kings

MS Dhoni*†, B Aparajith, R Ashwin, S Badree, F du Plessis, JW Hastings, MJ Henry, BW Hilfenhaus, DJ Hussey, RA Jadeja, BB McCullum, M Manhas, RG More, P Negi, A Nehra, IC Pandey, SK Raina, V Shankar, MM Sharma, DR Smith

Squads and data taken from ESPNCricinfo.