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Latest News:

1. Kolkata Night Riders Has Added New Zeland's Fast Bowler Shane Bond in Their Team.
2. Mumbai Indians Has Added West Indies All Rounder Pollard in Their Team.

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The Sri Lankan captain Kumar Sangakkara has replaced Yuvraj Singh as the captain of Kings XI Punjab for this year's IPL. Speculation was rife over the past few weeks in India that Sangakkara was the man to take over the captaincy and Anil Srivatsa, the franchise's chief executive officer, confirmed the news today.
"Kumar Sangakkara is the new captain of Kings XI Punjab. We are hoping for good things to come out of it," he told reporters in New Delhi.
Under Yuvraj's captaincy in the inaugural IPL in 2008, Punjab had qualified for semi-finals. But in the second edition, held in South Africa last year, they failed to make it to the last four. Yuvraj was Punjab's highest run scorer in 2009 with 340 at 28.33, with two half-centuries, but that was not enough to lift their fortunes.
Srivatsa said the move would not take away from Yuvraj's importance as a star player, and that on the contrary the management hoped it would bring forth more runs from the allrounder. "Being taken off the leadership role does not diminish Yuvraj's standing in the team. Yuvraj's inputs are vital for us," he said. "He has done well for the team in the past two seasons and he has one more year with us. He did his job well enough. This has got nothing to do with all this."
Sangakkara said he had spoken to Yuvraj immediately after being told about the change of leadership. "I have enjoyed playing under Yuvraj, he is a very able captain. When everything was not concrete, I spoke to him and after that I decided that it was the right time to take up [the] captaincy.
"I don't think it would cause any problem. He is a very good friend. I had a long chat with him on this, everything was done very transparently. Moreover, Yuvraj is the most important player in our side. Any IPL team will be lucky to have him. He can change a match just like that. He is a matchwinner."
Sangakkara was second to Yuvraj in South Africa with 332 runs at 30.18, with two half-centuries.

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After the IPL auctions, all team owners unanimously said that there was no previous agenda and only availability and practical considerations prevented them from bidding for Pakistan players.

However, Shah Rukh Khan - co-owner of the Kolkata Knight Riders - has now struck a discordant note. Shah Rukh feels that it was "humiliating" that the snub to the Pakistan players has taken place.

Speaking to television channel NDTV, Shah Rukh said, "I think its actually humiliating to me as a KKR owner that this has happened. We are known to be good, we are known to invite everyone, and we should have. And if there were any issues, they should have been put out earlier so that everything could happen respectfully."

"I truly believe that they should have been chosen. As a matter of fact, I'm not going to be the one who is opposite from what everyone else is saying but I wanted Abdul Razzaq. I think it was in the newspapers much earlier than even the auction started. Dada (Sourav Ganguly) was very keen," he added.

Shah Rukh had previously picked Umar Gul and the troubled Shoaib Akhtar for the Knight Riders in the first season of the IPL. However, with the pressures of extraneous factors such as threats by political parties like the Shiv Sena, he said it became difficult for the owners. The Shiv Sena had said it would not allow Australian players to play in Mumbai until the racist attacks in Australia on Indians are stopped.

"There is going to be a section of people who have suddenly gotten up and have said, rightly or wrongly, ' Australians will not be allowed to play'. So here is a set of people who are spending up to 70, 80, 90 crore rupees on trying to win a tournament and suddenly, even if you say this much to me, I'm like 'uh-oh, so should I take or shouldn't I take him?'"

"So tomorrow, if we had known this, maybe even the Australians would not have been picked up. These issues always come prime on your head, the stakes are very high," he said.

"I am not giving an excuse and I truly believe Pakistani players are the best T20 players in the world. They are the champions. They are wonderful. But somewhere down the line there is an issue and we cannot deny it. There is an issue, we cannot keep saying 'Oh this was wrong'. Yes maybe the way it was done was wrong, the way it is being carried out may be wrong. But you can't keep on saying 'Koi issue nahi hai yaar, woh aa jate' (There isn't any issue, they could have come). There is an issue lets not deny it. Every day we blame Pakistan, everyday they blame us, it is an issue," he added.