Lucknow Super Giants captain KL Rahul is not part of their Playing XI in the 45th match of the ongoing 16th season of the Indian Premier League against Chennai Super Kings at the Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Cricket Stadium.

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With vice-captain Krunal Pandya walking out for the toss, it was confirmed that Rahul would be missing his first match for this franchise. Pandya, 32, has led Lucknow a couple of times when Rahul was off the ground but will be leading them as a designated captain for the first time today.

Pandya, however, ended up losing the toss on his captaincy debut in the biggest T20 league in the world. That being said, he remained unaffected primarily because of getting what he wanted. It is noteworthy that visiting captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni won the toss and opted to bowl first on a Wednesday afternoon.

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Why is KL Rahul Not Playing Today vs Chennai Super Kings?

Although Rahul was brave enough to bat at No. 11 against Royal Challengers Bangalore at the same venue on the day before yesterday, him hurting his leg in the second over of the match has it in it to rule him out of the subsequent matches as well.

Rahul’s absence is unequivocally a massive blow to the Super Giants for they will miss both their captain and opening batter despite a lot of criticism around his strike rate.

Other than Rahul, LSG have also left out batter Deepak Hooda, spinner Amit Mishra and pacer Yash Thakur in a total of four changes to their Playing XI. Hooda, another A-list name to have been benched, has scored only 53 runs across nine innings at an average and strike rate of 6.62 and 89.83 respectively this season. Batters Manan Vohra, Karan Sharma and Ayush Badoni and pacer Mohsin Khan have been included into the Playing XI.

Coming on the back of a 4-wicket loss against Punjab Kings at their home ground on Sunday, Chennai have made a lone change by including pacer Deepak Chahar for batter Ambati Rayudu.

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