Kolkata : Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) host the Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) for their second and league 6th match in the Indian Premier League 2026 at Eden Gardens, Kolkata, on Thursday, April 2, at 7:30 PM. Both teams aim to bounce back from their first loss of the season—KKR against the Mumbai Indians at Wankhede Stadium, and SRH against the Royal Challengers Bengaluru at M. Chinnaswamy Stadium.
KKR will play their first home match of the season today at Eden Gardens, and it will also be the start of three consecutive home games (KKR vs Punjab Kings on April 6 and KKR vs Lucknow Super Giants on April 9), along with today’s match against SRH. After this, KKR will travel for an away match against Chennai Super Kings on April 14 at M. A. Chidambaram Stadium. KKR clearly showed that they struggled due to their bowling lineup, which became the major cause of their defeat against MI in their very first match. The team had already suffered from several bowling injuries before the season started, which affected their pace attack. At that point, the team relied on their famous spin duo, Varun Chakravarthy and Sunil Narine, but they did not bring much success in the last match. Varun conceded 48 runs in 4 overs without taking any wickets, while Narine gave away 30 runs in 4 overs and took 1 wicket. With this weak bowling lineup, KKR need especially Varun and Narine, to perform better. However, KKR did well in batting in the last match, where MI had to chase a big total of 220 runs.
On the other side, SRH are also suffering from a very similar problem. Their weak bowling lineup became even more vulnerable in the absence of Pat Cummins. In the last match against RCB, their bowlers struggled to defend a total of around 200 runs. For their comeback, they also need a strong bowling performance. SRH have a power-packed top batting order with Abhishek Sharma, Travis Head, Ishan Kishan, and Heinrich Klaasen. To support their weak bowling unit, they will need to score high runs to make a strong comeback. KKR and SRH have played 30 matches against each other so far in the IPL, where KKR have won 20 matches and SRH have won 10.
Squad of KKR: Ajinkya Rahane (C), Rinku Singh, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Manish Pandey, Finn Allen, Tejasvi Singh, Rahul Tripathi, Tim Seifert, Rovman Powell, Anukul Roy, Cameron Green, Sarthak Ranjan, Daksh Kamra, Rachin Ravindra, Ramandeep Singh, Sunil Narine, Blessing Muzarabani, Vaibhav Arora, Matheesha Pathirana, Kartik Tyagi, Prashant Solanki, Saurabh Dubey, Navdeep Saini, Umran Malik, Varun Chakravarthy.
Predicted Playing XI for KKR: Finn Allen, Ajinkya Rahane (C), Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Cameron Green, Rinku Singh, Ramandeep Singh, Sunil Narine, Varun Chakravarthy, Vaibhav Arora, Kartik Tyagi, Blessing Muzarabani.
Squad of SRH: Ishan Kishan, Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Heinrich Klaasen, Harshal Patel, Liam Livingstone, Pat Cummins, Jaydev Unadkat, Aniket Verma, Smaran Ravichandran, Salil Arora, Kamindu Mendis, Harsh Dubey, Brydon Carse, Shivam Kumar, Krains Fuletra, David Payne, Zeeshan Ansari, Eshan Malinga, Sakib Hussain, Onkar Tarmale, Amit Kumar, Praful Hinge, Shivam Mavi.
Predicted Playing XI for SRH: Abhishek Sharma, Travis Head, Ishan Kishan, Heinrich Klaasen, Aniket Verma, Liam Livingstone, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Harshal Patel, Harsh Dubey, Eshan Malinga, Jaydev Unadkat.
The weather in Kolkata is expected to be mostly clear and warm, with temperatures around 28–31°C and high humidity. There is a slight chance of rain, but a full match is expected. Dew may form later, which could help the team chasing. Today’s pitch is expected to be batting-friendly, likely resulting in a high-scoring match. Batters may dominate, especially during the powerplay and death overs. Pacers could get early swing in the first few overs, while spinners will play a crucial role in the middle overs. This match will be exciting to watch as both teams will try hard to make a strong comeback
