Abhishek Nair has been appointed the head coach of Kolkata Knight Riders, a few weeks before the IPL 2026 auction. He will replace Chandrakant Pandit, who remained the head coach of KKR for three consecutive seasons. In the same year, Chandrakant had resigned from the post of head coach of KKR, after which the franchise was looking for a new coach. Abhishek is returning to the Kolkata team, because he has already been a part of the KKR support staff for five years.
42 year old Abhishek Nair is known for his unique coaching style. Nair was not a part of the KKR management in 2025, but at the time of IPL 2025, he was playing the role of assistant coach of the Indian cricket team. Let us remind you that recently Rohit Sharma had trained with Abhishek Nair. Nair said that Rohit can lose more weight in the next months. KL Rahul and Shreyas Iyer have also been training under Nair.
Abhishek Nair has also done scouting for KKR before this. Nair has made a major contribution in enhancing the talent of youth like Rinku Singh and Harshit Rana. This year, after stepping down from the post of assistant coach of the Indian team, Abhishek Nair was the head coach of UP Warriors in WPL 2025. Unfortunately, the UP team could win only 3 out of 8 matches and remained at the bottom position in the table.
The performance of Kolkata Knight Riders in IPL 2025 was very disappointing. It had registered only 5 wins in the season, due to which it remained eighth in the table. This performance was disappointing also because KKR was coming after winning the IPL 2024 title. Despite being the defending champions, Kolkata could not even come close to qualifying for the playoffs.
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