KKR vs PBKS Highlights, IPL 2026: Match abandoned due to rain; points shared between the two teams

That’s all from us for today! It turned out to be a damp squib of a match in the end, but it’s a day with plenty of questions nonetheless. KKR escapes without a defeat, but serious tactical questions must be asked about its decision to bat first in rainy conditions.

More on that for a later day, but until tomorrow, good night!

The umpires tell the two captains, Ajinkya Rahane and Shreyas Iyer that the outfield is too wet to hold the match and the contest is officially called off. Both captains shake hands with each other and that’s the end of today’s proceedings. A shame for the fans and especially PBKS, who looked well set to secure another victory. KKR, considering the situation it was in, will be the happier of the two sides with this result.

In the outside possibility that we do end up having a five over match, Xavier Bartlett, who dismissed Finn Allen and Cameron Green and was in the middle of bowling the fourth over when rain stopped play, will not be allowed to complete the over. As per the rules, in the event of a five over match, every bowler is allowed to bowl only one over. Bartlett has already exhausted his quota and one of his bowling teammates will have to take over. Arshdeep Singh can’t bowl either, and it will have to be one of Chahal, Vysakh Vijaykumar, or Marco Jansen.

The umpires are now talking to the curator and Sourav Ganguly, the suspense continues...

Twenty eight minutes to go now, and still no official update on whether the match will resume. Sourav Ganguly, the president of CAB, is in the ground assessing the dampness of the outfield and having conversations with the groundstaff.

Here we go! The groundstaff have started removing the covers from the ground, but is it too late? 35 minutes to go to hold a five overs match. Umpires are out on the ground, checking the conditions and the state of the outfield and the pitch.

A surpisingly positive update from Kolkata, where the rain has abated! The cut-off time for a match is 11:14PM IST, which leaves us with the best part of 40 minutes to get a game going.

Will we make it? Stay with us to find out.

Washed out match between KKR and PBKS at Eden Gardens? Both sides have already been there and done that. It was a year ago that KKR vs PBKS faced off at the Eden Gardens and like today’s match, the weather had the final say in that game. The fans at least got to witness the first innings last year, in contrast to today where they got to experience only 3.4 overs of live action.

The prospects of a resumption do seem bleak now, but while we wait for official confirmation of a decision, read Pranay Rajiv’s preview of tomorrow’s match between Rajasthan Royals and Mumbai Indians below:

RR vs MI, IPL 2026: Fast-starting Rajasthan Royals takes on Mumbai Indians’ might

Rajasthan Royals faces Mumbai Indians in IPL 2026, featuring a thrilling matchup between Vaibhav Suryavanshi and Jasprit Bumrah.

Still raining in Kolkata and the match is unfortunately heading towards a wash out. Frustrating for PBKS, who got a great start with the ball and were favourites to win today’s game. KKR lucky to go away with a point from this contest.

A quick piece of news, we will begin losing overs at 9:10PM.

Things aren’t looking promising for now.

Shayan Acharya from the ground reports that the rain has intensified, forcing spectators in the lower tier to vacate their seats and scramble for cover. Not good news this.

Ground Inspection to take place at 8:45 PM. Fingers crossed that the match can get underway soon.

Encouraging visuals from Kolkata, the covers are starting to come off. We wait for an official announcement as to what time the match will restart.

From the visuals, it looks like rain has stopped, and play could resume soon.

Bartlett with his second. What a first over he had. Raghuvanshi defends, dot ball. Nice shape in that one, outswinger from Bartlett again, Raghuvanshi defends. Raghuvanshi hits it to mid off for a single BUT WAIT A MINUTE! KKR GET FIVE RUNS OFF THE OVERTHROW! Shreyas Iyer gets his aim wrong and the ball goes through the gap in fine leg all the way to the boundary. Good length ball from Bartlett, Rahane hits it straight to mid wicket. Uh Oh. IPL fans, look away, its raining in Kolkata. The covers have come on, play has stopped.

Arshdeep with his second. Rahane takes a single. The captain will need to step up here for the home side after two massive wickets. Angriksh Raghuvanshi at four. Slower ball from Arshdeep, beats Raghuvanshi, dot ball. Raghuvanshi defends but that takes the inside edge and the ball rolls onto the leg side, single. Rahane takes a single on the off side. Raghuvanshi leaves that one alone. Raghuvanshi hits it off his pads on the leg side for a single.

Xavier Bartlett to bowl the second. Allen on strike. Ooohhh swing and a miss from Allen, outswinger from Bartlett beats the outside edge. WHAT WAS THAT?!!! COMEDY OF ERRORS!! ALLEN TRIES TO RAMP UP BUT DOES NOT CONNECT, PRABHSIMRAN COLLECTS THE BALL AND THROWS IT STRAIGHT TO HIS BOWLER!! Shreyas Iyer sees the funny side to that.

Swing and a miss from Allen again. Bartlett gets Allen! Outside edges it to the keeper, beautiful from outswinger from Bartlett, after beating Allen twice gets him on the third time of asking using the same delivery. OUT!

Finn Allen c Prabhsimran Singh b Xavier Bartlett 6(7) [4s-1]

Cameron Green in at three. Oooohhh that was almost two in two, Cameron Green outside edges it just beyond short third for a BOUNDARY! Lucky for Green. AND GREEN IS GONE! ANOTHER OUTSWINGER, ANOTHER OUTSIDE EDGE, AND PRABHSIMRAN SINGH TAKES IT!

Cameron Green c Prabhsimran Singh b Xavier Bartlett 4(2) [4s-1]

Finn Allen and Ajinkya Rahane walk out to the middle to open the batting for KKR. Arshdeep Singh takes the new ball for PBKS. Rahane on strike, first slip in place. Rahane guides it off his pads to the leg side for a single. Outswinger from Arshdeep, Allen defends and takes a quick single. Oooohhh nicely done from Rahane, guides it nicely in the gap between first slip and short third for a BOUNDARY! Rahane hits it to the off side for a single, good cricket from the KKR captain. Full toss from Arshdeep, misses out on the yorker, inside edge from Allen and that races away to the BOUNDARY! Another full toss, Allen hits it to mid off for a single.

Navdeep Saini makes his KKR debut today, in place of the injured Varun Chakaravarthy.

KKR were dealt a huge blow as KKR captain Ajinkya Rahane revealed at the toss that both Varun Chakaravarthy and Sunil Narine will miss today’s game, with Chakaravarthy injured and Narine ruled out with illness. Chakaravarthy injured himself while taking a fine catch of Nitish Kumar Reddy against SRH.

The last time KKR played without Narine and Chakaravarthy was way back in 2019. With an already depleted bowling line-up and without their primary strike bowlers in Chakaravarthy and Narine, how will KKR’s bowling lineup fare against PBKS explosive batting lineup? Can Anukul Roy, KKR’s lone spinner today, step up in their absence? It will be a big ask.

Priyansh Arya, Vishnu Vinod, Suryansh Shedge, Pravin Dubey, Harpreet Brar.

Prabhsimran Singh (wk), Shreyas Iyer (c), Cooper Connolly, Nehal Wadhera, Shashank Singh, Marcus Stoinis, Marco Jansen, Xavier Bartlett, Arshdeep Singh, Yuzvendra Chahal, Vijaykumar Vyshak.

Rahul Tripathi, Tejasvi Singh, Saurabh Dubey, Manish Pandey, Blessing Muzarabani.

Finn Allen, Ajinkya Rahane (c), Cameron Green, Angkrish Raghuvanshi (wk), Rovman Powell, Rinku Singh, Ramandeep Singh, Anukul Roy, Navdeep Saini, Vaibhav Arora, Kartik Tyagi.

Shreyas Iyer and Ajinkya Rahane are out in the middle, up goes the coin...and it lands in favour of Kolkata Knight Riders, which will bat first! Rahane says that the wicket looks a little dry, and that it wants to put runs on the board. Two changes, Varun is injured and Narine is sick. Rovman Powell and Navdeep Saini come in.

Shreyas says PBKS wanted to bowl first anyways. Showers praise upon coach Ricky Ponting, and PBKS is going with the same team.

The Eden Gardens wicket has very helpful for batting recently, and in the last match on this ground, Sunrisers Hyderabad posted a 200+ score again. There are also some patches on the pitch.

The weather around means that both sides will probably look to bowl first, a preference that will be emphasised by the fact that the pitch has been covered for the best part of two days.

It’s not often that Varun Chakravarthy leaks runs and goes two games without taking a wicket but that’s exactly the kind of start the mystery spinner has had this season for KKR. His side has conceded two 220 plus totals in a row and one could argue that had Chakravarthy been in form, KKR would have controlled the flow of runs in the middle overs better, and a few more wickets would have fallen, guaranteed. Can third time be the charm for Chakravarthy? KKR will desperately hope so.

Nehal Wadhera has had a quiet start to the tournament with the bat so far, getting dismissed early in two outings. Wadhera was one of the standout performers for PBKS last season, scoring crucial runs down the order to help his side finish its batting innings on a high more often than not. Wadhera is the only batter in the lineup who has not been amongst the runs this season, and the 25-year-old from Ludhiana will be looking to make up for the shortage of runs against KKR tonight.

It’s still dry at Eden Gardens for now, but its become sultry says Shayan Acharya. Rain is on the cards later, and likely to interrupt proceedings, but let’s see how things progress.

KKR captain Ajinkya Rahane has been pretty defensive about his batting form and strike rate, maintaining that he has one of the best PowerPlay strike rates among openers in the IPL since 2023 and T20 is such a game where consistency is difficult to keep up. While if there’s any truth to his claims or not is a different conversation to have altogether, Rahane will be determined to silence the critics with a strong showing against PBKS tonight. The skipper with the bat has had a mixed tournament so far, scoring a 50 in the first game and getting dismissed for eight runs against SRH.

Sunil Narine is comfortably the leading wicket-taker in matches between KKR and PBKS, and will be looking to extend his record tonight. Here is the complete list of top wicket-takers in KKR vs PBKS matches:

Sunil Narine - 36 wickets @ 20.27, ER 7.01

Piyush Chawla - 24 wickets @ 26.41, ER 7.99

Umesh Yadav - 19 wickets @ 17.63, ER 7.44

Andre Russell - 15 wickets @ 22.2, ER 10.35

Varun Chakaravarthy - 12 wickets @ 26.33, ER 7.52

Former Kolkata Knight Riders captain Gautam Gambhir leads the way for most runs in matches between KKR and PBKS. Here is the full list of top run-scorers:

Gautam Gambhir - 492 runs @ 44.72, SR 121.78

Andre Russell - 449 runs @ 34.53, SR 197.79

Robin Uthappa - 438 runs @ 33.69, SR 142.67

Wriddhiman Saha - 392 runs @ 39.40, SR 144.85

Chris Gayle - 331 runs @ 41.37, SR 158.37

Prabhsimran Singh, Priyansh Arya, Cooper Connolly, Shreyas Iyer, Nehal Wadhera, Shashank Singh, Marcus Stoinis, Marco Jansen, Xavier Bartlett, Yuzvendra Chahal, Arshdeep Singh, Vijaykumar Vyshak (IP).

Finn Allen, Ajinkya Rahane (c), Angkrish Raghuvanshi (wk), Cameron Green, Rinku Singh, Anukul Roy, Ramandeep Singh, Sunil Narine, Kartik Tyagi, Blessing Muzarabani, Varun Chakaravarthy, Vaibhav Arora (IP).

Another weather update from the ground. “Cloudy, but alright” says Shayan Acharya from the ground.

Fingers crossed that holds.

Kolkata Knight Riders suffered its second consecutive defeat of the season against Sunrisers Hyderabad last time out, collapsing to a 65-run loss in a tall chase of 227.

Sunrisers was given a fast start by openers Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma, who both reached the 40s in quick time, before Heinrich Klaasen smashed a fifty. Nitish Kumar Reddy then put the finishing touches on the innings as SRH reached 226 for eight.

In the chase, Finn Allen got KKR off to a fast start, but his dismissal was the beginning of a slide for the host. Angkrish Raghuvanshi hit a fifty, but KKR was finally dismissed for 161.

Punjab Kings comes into this match having won two on the bounce. Its last win was an impressive one, thrashing Chennai Super Kings by five wickets in Chennai.

Batting first, India U-19 captain Ayush Mhatre smashed 73 from 42 balls for CSK, while Sarfaraz Khan and Shivam Dube played handy cameos to help the home side reach 209 for five in its 20 overs.

However, a blistering opening salvo of 39 from 11 balls and a 26-ball fifty from Shreyas Iyer along with support from Prabhsimran Singh and Cooper Connolly helped the visitor make short work of the total, as PBKS maintained its perfect record.

PBKS created history against KKR last year at Mullanpur when it successfully defended 111, the lowest total to be defended by any team in the history of the IPL. But this wasn’t the first instance of history being created in a match between KKR and PBKS. Go back a couple of years and Eden Gardens witnessed the highest chase in IPL ever, with PBKS chasing down KKR’s target of 261. The fixture has historically produced many milestone moments, will we witness another one tonight?

Kolkata Knight Riders’ abject start to the season has brought the performances of skipper Ajinkya Rahane into the spotlight. The 37-year-old has struck quickly in the PowerPlay against pace, but has struggled comparitively against the spinners.

Rahane has hit back at his critics, saying that they were “jealous” of him, and tonight will offer him a chance to walk the walk after having talked the talk.

One of the leading faces of Punjab Kings’ renaissance last year was skipper Shreyas Iyer. Shreyas scored 604 runs at a strike-rate of 175.07, and has started this season in fine touch again, peeling off a half-century in the Kings’ win over Chennai Super Kings last time out.

Tonight, he returns to face Kolkata Knight Riders, the team which he captained to the title in 2024. KKR opted to release him ahead of the 2025 mega-auction, and looking at the way things have panned out since then, it is a decision that it may be regretting.

Prabhsimran Singh, Priyansh Arya, Shreyas Iyer, Shashank Singh, Nehal Wadhera, Marcus Stoinis, Azmatullah Omarzai, Marco Jansen, Harpreet Brar, Yuzvendra Chahal, Arshdeep Singh, Musheer Khan, Pyala Avinash, Harnoor Pannu, Suryansh Shedge, Mitchell Owen, Xavier Bartlett, Lockie Ferguson, Vyshak Vijaykumar, Yash Thakur, Vishnu Vinod, Cooper Connolly, Ben Dwarshuis, Pravin Dubey, Vishal Nishad.

There is the threat of rain interrupting today’s match, with KKR’s practice yesterday having been called off due to inclement weather.

The good news is that as of now, it is sunny at the ground but it’s worth noting that the possibility of rain is in there tonight.

Ajinkya Rahane, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Anukul Roy, Navdeep Saini, Manish Pandey, Ramandeep Singh, Rinku Singh, Rovman Powell, Sunil Narine, Umran Malik, Vaibhav Arora, Varun Chakaravarthy, Cameron Green, Finn Allen, Matheesha Pathirana, Tejasvi Singh, Kartik Tyagi, Prashant Solanki, Rahul Tripathi, Tim Seifert, Blessing Muzarabani, Sarthak Ranjan, Daksh Kamra, Rachin Ravindra, Saurabh Dubey.

Hello, and welcome to Sportstar’s live coverage of the IPL 2026 match between Kolkata Knight Riders and Punjab Kings at the Eden Gardens on Monday, April 6!

Kolkata Knight Riders is yet to win after two games in the season, while Punjab Kings has a faultless record of its own coming into today’s match. With the threat of rain around, will either of those streaks be broken today?

Stay with us to find out.

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