Toss Sunrisers Hyderabad chose to bowl vs Rajasthan Royals

Pat Cummins, the Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) captain, has chosen to bowl in the IPL 2026 Eliminator against Rajasthan Royals (RR) in New Chandigarh. Cummins cited the positive record of chasing teams at this venue – three wins in four matches this season – as the reason for his decision.

Riyan Parag, the RR captain, said he would have preferred to chase too.

Praful Hinge came back into SRH’s line-up, replacing Harshal Patel in their pace attack, suggesting that SRH might have felt there was more likelihood of new-ball help in the surface than assistance for cutters and slower balls. Salil Arora or Aniket Verma, who both start on the bench, could come in as Impact Player when SRH chase.

There was only one change in RR’s XI, though not necessarily in their match squad, with Ravindra Jadeja in the starting line-up and Shubham Dubey on the Impact Player bench. Given RR are batting first, Dubey could replace one of the dismissed top-order batters during their innings, or a bowler – Ravi Bishnoi or Tushar Deshpande depending on the conditions – could come in when they bowl.

SRH have met RR twice this season and won both times. RR, meanwhile, have never lost a game in New Chandigarh, having played and beaten Punjab Kings three times here.

RR batting-first XI: 1 Yashasvi Jaiswal, 2 Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, 3 Dhruv Jurel (wk), 4 Riyan Parag (capt), 5 Donovan Ferreira, 6 Dasun Shanaka, 7 Ravindra Jadeja, 8 Jofra Archer, 9 Nandre Burger, 10 Brijesh Sharma, 11 Yash Raj Punja

RR Impact Player options: Shubham Dubey, Sushant Mishra, Aman Perala, Ravi Bishnoi, Tushar Deshpande

SRH bowling-first XI: 1 Abhishek Sharma, 2 Travis Head, 3 Ishan Kishan (wk), 4 Heinrich Klaasen, 5 R Smaran, 6 Nitish Kumar Reddy, 7 Pat Cummins, 8 Shivang Kumar, 9 Eshan Malinga, 10 Sakib Hussain, 11 Praful Hinge

SRH Impact Player options: Aniket Verma, Salil Arora, Liam Livingstone, Harsh Dubey, Harshal Patel