IPL Predictions and Betting Tips

David Warner, who had earlier stepped down as captain of the team, was banned from playing in this year's IPL due to his role in the ball-tampering scandal during Australia's test series in South Africa. The team had signed England explosive batsman Alex Hales as his replacement with New Zealand captain Kane Williamson leading the team this season. Opening batsman Shikhar Dhawan was retained by the Sunrisers who have a total of 25 players on their roster including eight overseas players. Top-order batsman Manish Pandey and Afghanistan's spin star Rashid Khan were amongst the top buys of the IPL 2018 player auction. Despite the absence of Warner, SRH still have a strong squad featuring some serious game-changers and they stand a good chance of going a long way in the tournament, given their successful campaigns in the previous two seasons. Meanwhile, Australian fast bowler Billy Stanlake picked up a finger injury during the Sunrisers' match against the Chennai Super Kings and has been ruled of the remainder of the tournament. The team has not announced a replacement yet.

Kane Williamson (c), Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Shikhar Dhawan, Shakib Al Hasan, Manish Pandey, Carlos Brathwaite, Yusuf Pathan, Wriddhiman Saha, Rashid Khan, Ricky Bhui, Deepak Hooda, Siddarth Kaul, T Natarajan, Mohammad Nabi, Basil Thampi, K Khaleel Ahmed, Sandeep Sharma, Sachin Baby, Chris Jordan, Tanmay Agarwal, Shreevats Goswami, Bipul Sharma, Mehdi Hasan, Alex Hales

RCB retained their skipper in Virat Kohli along with Sarfaraz Khan and South African batting maestro AB de Villiers. Brendon McCullum, Quinton de Kock, Chris Woakes, Colin de Grandhomme and Moeen Ali were all drafted in as part of the team's overseas contingent. This time, they have offloaded Chris Gayle from their squad and have given preference to players who are known for their consistency. With so many options to choose from, their main challenge this season will be to find the right balance for their playing eleven.

Virat Kohli (c), AB de Villiers, Sarfaraz Khan, Brendon McCullum, Chris Woakes, Colin de Grandhomme, Moeen Ali, Quinton de Kock, Umesh Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Manan Vohra, Kulwant Khejroliya, Aniket Choudhary, Navdeep Saini, Murugan Ashwin, Mandeep Singh, Washington Sundar, Pawan Negi, Mohammed Siraj, Parthiv Patel, Anirudha Joshi, Pavan Deshpande, Tim Southee, Corey Anderson

The Knight Riders appointed Dinesh Karthik as their new captain with their 19-man squad consisting of seven overseas players. West Indian all-rounders Sunil Narine and Andre Russell were the ones to be retained by the franchise. Australian players Chris Lynn and Mitchell Starc were their top purchases at the auction. Unfortunately for the franchise, the latter has been ruled out of the IPL 2018 with a tibial bone stress and the paceman has been replaced by England fast bowler Tom Curran. Kamlesh Nagarkoti is the latest to join the injury list. The fast bowler has been ruled out of the remainder of the tournament with a foot injury and has been replaced by Prasidh Krishna. So their bench strength looks a tad weak at the moment and a few of their foreign recruits like Lynn and Johnson are also prone to injury. KKR do have a formidable bowling attack but since they are already very thin on resources, a couple more injuries could really mess up their season.

Dinesh Karthik (c), Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Chris Lynn, Robin Uthappa, Mitchell Johnson, Piyush Chawla, Kuldeep Yadav, Shubman Gill, Ishank Jaggi, Nitish Rana, Vinay Kumar, Apoorv Wankhade, Rinku Singh, Shivam Mavi, Cameron Delport, Javon Searles, Tom Curran, Prasidh Krishna

They retained skipper Rohit Sharma, Hardik Pandya and Jasprit Bumrah for this season but lost Australian paceman Pat Cummins for the entire tournament due to a back injury. Adam Milne, the fast bowler from New Zealand, was announced as replacement for Cummins. The Indians reached their maximum quota of eight overseas signings and completed their squad with 25 players. Though they do have good all-round options in the likes of Pandya, Pollard and Duminy, a not-so strong batting and lack of specialist spinners in the side could dampen their progress in this year's IPL.

Rohit Sharma (c), Jasprit Bumrah, Hardik Pandya, Kieron Pollard, Mustafizur Rahman, Suryakumar Yadav, Krunal Pandya, Ishan Kishan, Rahul Chahar, Evin Lewis, Saurabh Tiwary, Ben Cutting, Pradeep Sangwan, Jean-Paul Duminy, Tajinder Singh, Sharad Lumba, Siddhesh Lad, Aditya Tare, Mayank Markande, Akila Dananjaya, Anukul Roy, Mohsin Khan, MD Nidheesh, Mitchell McClenaghan

Gautam Gambhir was initially named captian of the side but he has stepped down from captaincy following a string of defeats. The Daredevils had retained batsmen Rishabh Pant and Shreyas Iyer along with South African all-rounder Chris Morris from the previous season. However, Morris sustained a back injury mid-way through the tournament and has been replaced by South African team-mate Junior Dala. The team is already missing the services of fast bowler Kagiso Rabada who too had been ruled out of the IPL 2018 with a back injury. England paceman Liam Plunkett was added into the squad as his replacement. The team features a lot of explosive batsmen and their stock of overseas fast bowlers looks pretty solid too. Australian limited-overs specialist Glenn Maxwell is their most expensive purchase of the IPL 11. Their batting looks solid enough with Gambhir, Munro and Roy at the top of the order, but bowling is where they seem to have fallen short which could be the reason for their undoing.

Shreyas Iyer (c), Gautam Gambhir, Rishabh Pant, Glenn Maxwell, Jason Roy, Colin Munro, Mohammed Shami, Amit Mishra, Prithvi Shaw, Rahul Tewatia, Vijay Shankar, Harshal Patel, Avesh Khan, Shahbaz Nadeem, Daniel Christian, Jayant Yadav, Gurkeerat Singh Mann, Trent Boult, Manjot Kalra, Abhishek Sharma, Sandeep Lamichhane, Naman Ojha, Sayan Ghosh, Liam Plunkett, Junior Dala

Left-arm spinner Axar Patel is the only one who was retained by the KXIP in their 21-man squad. Andrew Tye and Marcus Stoinis are two of their seven overseas recruitments who are in good form but Chris Gayle and David Miller have not been at their best of late. The team's biggest worry would be the lack of a specialist wicket-keeping option and how well Ravichandran Ashwin is able to take up his new role as captain of the side. KXIP look spoilt for choices when it comes to batting, but apart from Ashwin and Andrew Tye, their bowling does not instill too much confidence.

Ravichandran Ashwin (c), Axar Patel, Yuvraj Singh, Karun Nair, Lokesh Rahul, Chris Gayle, David Miller, Aaron Finch, Marcus Stoinis, Mayank Agarwal, Ankit Rajpoot, Manoj Tiwary, Mohit Sharma, Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Barinder Sran, Andrew Tye, Akshdeep Nath, Ben Dwarshuis, Pardeep Sahu, Mayank Dagar, Manzoor Dar

CSK retained their skipper MS Dhoni along with top-order batsman Suresh Raina and all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja. They have been hit by a couple of injury blows. New Zealand all-rounder Mitchell Santner will be unavailable for the entire season due to a knee injury while key batsman Kedar Jadhav who sustained a hamstring injury during the game against Mumbai Indians has also been ruled out of the tournament. The latter has been replaced by England all-rounder David Willey. The Super Kings went only for the seasoned campaigners on the first day of the auction and picked up eight uncapped players the very next day. Pacemen Lungi Ngidi and Mark Wood are part of the Super Kings' 25-man squad but they don't have any experience of playing in Indian conditions. The presence of several experienced campaigners will benefit the team in critical moments and with a successful skipper like Dhoni at the helm, they should make it to the play-offs.

Ajinkya Rahane is leading the team this year in place of Steven Smith who was banned from playing the IPL's 11th edition on account of his involvement in the ball-tampering saga. Heinrich Klaasen, the wicketkeeper-batsman from South Africa, was drafted into the squad as replacement for Smith. Meanwhile, the Royals have signed Kiwi spinner Ish Sodhi as a like-for-like replacement for the injured Afghanistan spinner Zahir Khan. The franchise bagged the two most expensive signings at the player auction - England ace all-rounder Ben Stokes and Indian seamer Jaydev Unadkat who had an impressive last season. They have packed in a lot of players who played for the Rising Pune Supergiant last year. With a fine mix of big-hitting batsmen and threatening fast bowlers, the Royals could give the rest of the teams a good run for their money. The team appears slightly thin on spin options but that is unlikely to stop them from having a successful season.