Spinners Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav Face Trial By Fire In IPL

Until a couple of years ago, both Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav were Virat Kohli's strike bowlers in limited-overs formats for India. However, they are now fighting for survival and the upcom

With off-spinner Washington Sundar also likely to be a certainty following his exploits for India in recent series against Australia and England, Chahal could find the competition tough.

RCB director of cricket Mike Hesson on Tuesday made it evident that pace bowlers will play a key role while pointing out they have picked a variety of pacers - those that can bring in variations like cutters etc and those that make the ball bounce and extract pace.

"We have back-up players, providing more depth. We want to change the style of play on particular venues, there might be certain grounds where we need players (pace bowlers) who bowl more cutters, there might be certain grounds where we need bounce bowlers," Hesson had said on Tuesday hinting that pace bowlers will play a key role this time.

For Yadav, the challenge to make the playing XI of KKR will be even greater. The Kolkata franchise, which already had spinners Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarthy in their ranks along with Shakib Al Hasan and Pawan Negi, has also bought seasoned off-spinner Harbhajan Singh for this season.

Other than Yadav being one of his kind, there is no other thing that makes him a sureshot starter in the XI. Yadav featured in just five matches and picked only one wicket.