The TATA Indian Premier League (IPL) 2026, match no.6 between Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) and Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) at the Eden Gardens, Kolkata have ended as SRH beat KKR by 65 runs. Both teams came into this match after being completely outplayed in their first match. KKR captain Ajinkya Rahane won the toss and elected to field first as the Knights fielded the unchanged side.
SRH made one change brought in Shivang Kumar in the side. The Orange Army openers, Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma, were off to a flyer as they went berserk against the KKR bowlers and smashed them every part of the ground. They scored 84/1 in the first six overs. Head scored 46 off 21 balls. The latter smacked Varun Chakravarthy for 25 runs inside the power play.
Abhishek Sharma was amazing with the bat
Ishan Kishan and Abhishek Sharma were back in the pavilion in the same over with Blessing Muzarabani picking up two wickets, as Varun Chakravarthy took a controversial catch to dismiss the latter. KKR came back into the game with those two wickets. From 110/1, they were 118/4 as Ajinkya Rahane’s team pulled back some runs.
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At the end, Heinrich Klaasen scored 52 off 35 balls, and Nitish Kumar Reddy also scored 39 off 24 balls, which helped the Orange Army to score 226/8 in their 20 overs. KKR would have been happy, as at one stage, 250 seemed possible by the SRH.
KKR fails to register their first win
Coming out to chase the Knights, had an amazing start with Finn Allen scoring 25 runs off the first over from David Payne. However, Allen was dismissed on the score of 28 off 7 balls, as Harsh Dubey took a sharp catch on the next ball after hitting a boundary.
The Knights then had a flurry of wickets, with two run-outs of Cameron Green and Angkrish Raghuvanshi. They were 151/6 at the end of 14 overs with Sunil Narine and Ramandeep Singh in the crease. They could not even play the full 20 overs as they were bowled out for 162 runs.
I thought we needed a couple of big partnerships- Ajinkya Rahane
After the loss Ajinkya Rahane said, “Yeah I thought we needed a couple of big partnerships. Guys who were set needed to take it deep. With the ball I thought we came back really well. In batting, when you are chasing a target, you need that partnership but we didn’t get that. [Grass on the pitch] Second innings, I felt the ball was slightly stopping.”
“Slower balls were gripping a lot more than first innings. We thought the wicket would get better but it got slower. But not making excuses. SRH did good use of the slower balls and the angles they used were really good.”
Rahane further added, “Winning home games is really important so we have to go back to the drawing room and think about our combination, if we need an extra batter. But we don’t need to think too much. Just one bad day.”
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