Delhi Daredevils won the toss and opted to field first in their first home match of the season against Kings XI Punjab at the Feroz Kotla, New Delhi.
Unfortunately, for Kings XI, Chris Gayle, who has been in red-hot form has to sit out because of a niggle. That opens the door for explosive middle order batsman David Miller, who will play his first match of the season.
Australia’s Aaron Finch will open the batting with KL Rahul in place of Chris Gayle.
"We aren't sure to be honest of how the surface will behave. Our first time here and it's quite tough to decide. Chris Gayle goes out and Aaron Finch will open the batting,” said Ashwin.
Daredevils on the other hand, made five changes to their side, two were forced ones, Jason Roy and Chris Morris are injured and will be replaced by Dan Christian and Liam Plunkett, who will make his IPL debut. So will India’s U 19 captain Prithvi Shaw. Leg spinner Amit Mishra also makes a comeback and young right-arm seamer Avesh Khan will play his first match for the Daredevils.
Interestingly Gambhir had mentioned only two changes during toss time.
Delhi Daredevils (Playing XI): Gautam Gambhir(c), Shreyas Iyer, Prithvi Shaw, Rishabh Pant(w), Glenn Maxwell, Daniel Christian, Rahul Tewatia, Liam Plunkett, Amit Mishra, Avesh Khan, Trent Boult
Kings XI Punjab (Playing XI): Lokesh Rahul(w), Aaron Finch, Mayank Agarwal, Karun Nair, Yuvraj Singh, David Miller, Ravichandran Ashwin(c), Andrew Tye, Barinder Sran, Ankit Rajpoot, Mujeeb Ur Rahman