Why is Mayank Yadav not playing today's KKR vs LSG match in IPL 2024?

Lucknow Super Giants (LSG)'s young pace sensation Mayank Yadav won't participate in their IPL 2024 match against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) at the Eden Gardens on Sunday as he continues to recover from his injury.

The right-arm quick was last seen in action on April 7 against the Gujarat Titans where he gingerly bowled just one over before walking off due to soreness in the lower abdomen area. He missed the team's next match against Delhi Capitals at home, which they lost. Afterwards, skipper KL Rahul had said that although Mayank wasn't feeling "too bad" but the franchise wanted to give him some time.

"Mayank is not too bad, he looks good, feeling good but we also want to make sure we don't rush him back in too early. He's young, we need to protect his body. He's itching to go, we just have to pull him back a little, maybe a couple of more games, before he comes back," Rahul said.

Earlier, LSG head coach Justin Langer had spoken in detail about his injury.

"He felt a little bit of tightness at the top of his hip leading into the last game, but that was about a one-out-of-ten pain, and we thought that they were clinical signs," Langer said.

"Everything through the doctors and the physios seemed perfectly okay. He bowled that first over (against Titans) and started feeling something in his hip. But we had an MRI scan, and there is a very, very small swelling in there. So we are very hopeful he'll start building himself up and be back bowling again soon," the coach added.

Mayank has been by far the fastest bowler in the IPL, having clocked a maximum pace of 156.7 kmph against Royal Challengers Bengaluru. However, despite calls of fast-tracking him to India's T20 and Test sides, LSG have always maintained that they'll have to manage his workload because his body is quite injury prone.

LSG's playing 11 without Mayank Yadav

The 21-year-old's absence is a massive blow to LSG. Eden Gardens has become a pacer's den in recent years and he'd have enjoyed bowling here against KKR's batters who have a history of struggles agains express pace.

Here's LSG's playing 11 for batting first: Quinton de Kock, KL Rahul (c & wk), Deepak Hooda, Marcus Stoinis, Nicholas Pooran, Ayush Badoni, Krunal Pandya, Mohsin Khan, Ravi Bishnoi, Shamar Joseph and Yash Thakur.