IPL 2024: Phil Salt replaces Jason Roy at KKR

Phil Salt has been named Jason Roy's replacement at Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) for the upcoming Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 season. Roy has backed out of the tournament, citing personal reasons. This will be Salt's second season in the IPL after turning up for Delhi Capitals (DC) last season. 

He went unsold in the IPL 2024 auction despite scoring back-to-back T20 International (T20I) hundreds for England against West Indies - one of which incidentally came on December 19 - on the auction day. 

The Knight Riders have secured the wicketkeeper-batter's services for his base price of INR 1.5 crore. In his only season in the tournament, Salt managed 218 runs at a strike-rate of 163.91 in nine matches, which includes a couple of fifties.

Salt smashed 331 runs in five innings at a strike-rate of close to 186 in the series but had a disappointing SA20 after that, in which he managed just 116 runs at 12.88 (SR 143.2) for the Pretoria Capitals. He then turned his attention to the Desert Vipers at the ILT20 in the UAE, scoring 26 and 30 in his two appearances. 

Tipped to be a long-term option for Roy in white-ball cricket for England, Salt has scored over 5,000 runs in T20 cricket, doing so at an impressive strike-rate of 153.41. 

KKR kick-start their IPL 2024 campaign against Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) on March 23 at the Eden Gardens. They are the only team who will play just three matches in the first phase of the tournament, while the other teams will play at least four.