SIMON Katich, the Kolkata Knight Riders assistant coach, is confident that Sunil Narine has put behind him the issues he recently had with his bowling action.

Narine was reported for a suspect action during the PSL last month, and while he was able to continue playing that tournament because he was only reported once, he will come into the IPL with a lot of eyes on him, given his long history of trouble with his action.

Speaking to the media yesterday, Katich said Narine had put plenty of work into his action since the PSL, and was in good shape to start in Knight Riders’ season-opener against Royal Challengers Bangalore on Sunday.

“Obviously there were some issues recently in the PSL where he was playing for Lahore (Qalandars), but he’s since gone back to Trinidad and Tobago and spent a lot of time with (spin-bowling consultant) Carl Crowe, working on his action,” Katich said.

“Carl is his coach. The last few years he’s been working with him since he first got reported. He’s done a lot of hard work there, we’re pretty confident with where he’s at with the action at the moment, so hopefully we’ll see him back out there on Sunday.”

Narine was one of Knight Riders’ standout players last season, not just with the ball. He played a key role as a pinch-hitter at the top of the order as well, ending the season with 224 runs at a strike rate of 172.30. Katich didn’t rule out the possibility of Narine batting up the order this season as well.

“Last year, initially, he didn’t open – we had Gautam Gambhir and Chris Lynn who opened, but then after game 2, when Chris Lynn hurt his shoulder, we had to rejig the team balance-wise,” Katich said.

“We felt that Sunil opening was going to give us an advantage with the balance of our team and also free him up to play a role at the top of the order, of which he did a very, very good job.

“He’s primarily one of our main spinners, if not our number one spinner, but given the balance of our team, you never know where he’s going to bat. It all depends on what we feel the best combination is.” (ESPN Cricinfo)