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The Punjab Kings are a franchise cricket team participating in the cash-rich Indian Premier League (IPL) based in Punjab. Established in 2008 as the Kings XI Punjab (KXIP), the franchise is jointly owned by Mohit Burman, Ness Wadia, Preity Zinta and Karan Paul. The team plays its home matches at the PCA Stadium, Mohali. Since 2010, they also have been playing some of their home games at either Dharamsala or Indore. Apart from the 2014 season when they topped the league table and finished runners-up, the team has made only one other playoff appearance in 13 seasons.
About the franchise
Punjab Kings haven't won a single edition of the IPL to date. The team name was changed to Punjab Kings in February 2021. KL Rahul is the leading run-scorer and Piyush Chawla is the leading wicket-taker for Punjab Kings.
Team's history
The team does not have a great history to look back at except on the season they were the runners-up in the year 2014.
Team's owner
The franchise is jointly owned by Mohit Burman, Ness Wadia, Preity Zinta and Karan Paul.
Team's skipper
The PBKS had a change of captaincy in almost every season of the IPL. Yuvraj Singh was the Punjab Kings captain for the first two years, followed by Sangakkara and Jayawardene in the next couple of years. It was Adam Gilchrist’s turn from 2011 to 2013. In 2015, Sehwag took the responsibility. KL Rahul was finally appointed as the captain following the brief captaincy of Murali Vijay, Glen Maxwell and Ravichandran Ashwin. Punjab are yet to announce their captain for the 2022 season of the tournament although Mayank Agarwal seems to be leading the race.
ALSO READ: IPL 2022 Mega Auctions: What will be Punjab Kings’ Strategy?
IPL 2021 Squad
KL Rahul(w/c), Mayank Agarwal, Nicholas Pooran, Aiden Markram, Sarfaraz khan, Shahrukh Khan, Moises Henriques, Harpreet Brar, Mohammed Shami, Ravi Bishnoi, Arshdeep Singh, Adil Rashid, Mandeep Singh, Chris Jordan, Jalaj Saxena, Chris Gayle, Deepak Hooda, Fabian Allen, Saurabh Kumar, Ishan Porel, Utkarsh Singh, Darshan Nalkande, Prabhsimran Singh, Nathan Ellis, Murugan Ashwin
Retained players
Mayank Agarwal and Arshadeep Singh
Strategy for IPL 2022
Going into the auction for IPL 2022 Punjab kings will now need to find someone to lead the team. Having released KL Rahul they now need to find a captain. They can go for the likes of Manish Pandey or Ajinkya Rahane to captain the team or can trust Agarwal who is already with them. They need to build a strong and aggressive batting order which they have lacked in recent times.
