What's changed for KKR between 2022-23 and 2024 is the sense of structure and stability their line-ups have exuded.

You only need one statistic to sum up the stability KKR have enjoyed through IPL 2024. They used seven different openers in IPL 2022, and seven again in 2023. This season, they opened with Sunil Narine and Phil Salt in each of their first 12 games, and brought in Rahmanullah Gurbaz when Salt left on England duty.

A lot of this was happenstance, of course. When he joined the coaching staff and returned Narine to the top of the order, Gautam Gambhir couldn't have imagined that the move would bring a 482-run season with three fifties and a maiden T20 hundred. KKR didn't sign Salt at the IPL auction - it seems incredible now, but he went unsold - but as a replacement for Jason Roy; their team management couldn't have foreseen that Salt would light up the IPL with 435 runs at a strike rate of 182.00.

KKR have been similarly fortunate that nearly all their middle-order batters have found form at some point during the season. But the way their line-up is structured has allowed them to stick with a set of players and absorb failures.

This is in huge part down to the two world-class West Indian allrounders in their squad, Narine and Andre Russell. Which other team can call upon a four-over banker who also happens to be one of the most destructive openers in the tournament, as well as one of the league's most dangerous and experienced finishers who can deliver high-impact overs in the middle and death phases when required?

Because KKR have Narine and Russell, and because of the luxury of the Impact Player, they can enter match after match with eight batters and six bowlers. And if they happen to slip to 57 for 5, as they did against Mumbai Indians at the Wankhede, they can call a ninth batter off the bench without hampering their bowling.

When you're batting in a line-up with that sort of depth, you have no reason to hold back.