The final stretch - Three teams are through, one spot is left. That is where the IPL 2026 playoff picture stands right now, with just a handful of league fixtures to go. The race for that final berth has been fierce, absorbing, and it is only going to get more breathless from here. Match 66 brings us to Ahmedabad, where the Gujarat Titans host the Chennai Super Kings at the colossal Narendra Modi Stadium. Plenty to fight for - Royal Challengers Bengaluru, Gujarat Titans and Sunrisers Hyderabad have all punched their playoff tickets, and the battle among that trio is now about finishing in the top two. It was SRH's win over Chennai that effectively sealed the deal for both SRH and GT, but it left the Super Kings in a difficult spot. Sitting sixth after two straight defeats, CSK's path to the playoffs has gone from narrow to nearly surgical. A win here is non-negotiable, yet even then, the maximum they can climb to is 14 points, and that may not be enough without results elsewhere going their way. A net run rate sitting in the negative only adds to the pressure. The math is brutal, but it is not yet a closed book. For the Gujarat Titans, the motivation is different. The mission now is to finish as high up the table as possible. They carry the second-best net run rate in the competition, behind only RCB, and a win tonight could lift them to the very top of the standings. That said, the loss to KKR was a timely jolt. Sometimes a defeat like that is exactly the mirror a team needs before the knockout rounds arrive, a sharp reminder of what still needs fixing before the stakes get even higher. Bowling in sync - The big loss last time out should not ring too many alarm bells for the Titans. By and large, they have been a disciplined unit across all three departments this season. The one area that did creak against KKR was the bowling, which took a real beating at Eden Gardens, leaking 247 runs and managing just two wickets. Though they have conceded more than 50 runs in the Powerplay on average, their wicket returns have been fantastic, with them picking as many as 26 wickets inside the first six overs, which is among the teams with the most wickets in this phase. The chief architects of that early aggression are Kagiso Rabada and Mohammed Siraj, who have more often than not bowled three overs apiece in the Powerplay. The second line of attack has been just as threatening. Rashid Khan continues to weave his familiar magic in the middle overs, and the arrival of Jason Holder has given the attack a more complete look. Rashid holds the record for the most wickets at this ground, 29 in total, and sits second on GT's overall wicket-takers list behind Rabada this season. But it is Holder who has made the loudest entrance, snapping up 13 wickets in just seven games and injecting that extra cutting edge the attack was perhaps missing. Sai-Su leads the way - Six fluent half centuries and a classy hundred. That is the kind of consistency Sai Sudharsan has brought to this GT line-up and to the IPL as a whole this season. He sits firmly in contention among the best in the Orange Cap race with more than 550 runs, and right now, he is in the form of his life with four consecutive half centuries and counting. His partnership with skipper Shubman Gill has been one of the defining features of their campaign’s success so far. They have combined for over 1,100 runs this season and their opening partnership reads an average of 52.45. And with Jos Buttler back in form after a quiet few games, a brisk fifty last time out, the batting unit looks as complete as it has all season. Further down the order, Washington Sundar has been a picture of reliability at number five, chipping in with notable contributions one after another. It is that insane consistency with the bat that explains why GT have been bowled out just once all season. Hopes hanging by a thread - Call it bad luck or fate, but if CSK's season could be summed up in one word, it would be injuries. Across all departments and crucial times in the season, they have lost key players who have been central to their success this year. And yet, here they are. With a somewhat reshaped squad, still alive, still fighting, scrapping it out with four other teams for that final playoff spot. But injuries alone cannot excuse what has been a pretty underwhelming campaign. There have been genuine issues, areas they have neither addressed nor executed well enough, and those cracks have been hard to ignore. Of their seven defeats, five have come while defending totals, including three on the trot, a pattern that points to something worrisome. The Powerplay numbers with the ball tell the story plainly. They have conceded 91/1, 86/0 and 45/1 in their last three opening six overs, and across the season have managed just 16 wickets in that phase, one of the lowest tallies in the competition. More concerningly, their leading wicket-taker, Anshul Kamboj, who has crossed the 20-wicket mark this season, has looked a shadow of himself in recent matches. Noor Ahmad and Akeal Hosein have kept things reasonably tight, conceding just over eight runs an over between them, but the rest of the attack, the pacers in particular, have been either inconsistent or frustratingly expensive. Batting positives - One of the biggest drawbacks for CSK in the 2025 campaign was that they had the worst Powerplay batting average through and through. But with Sanju Samson, Kartik Sharma, and Urvil Patel batting proactively this year, they have found that cutting edge at the top that was so sorely missing before. They have averaged far better than the previous season in the first six overs, averaging 10. Ruturaj Gaikwad has not quite fired this season, and CSK have felt that absence keenly. A couple of half centuries in the middle of the campaign offered brief glimpses of his best, but the runs have dried up and the strike rate of 120.67 has raised eyebrows. Yet here is the curious part. Despite it being his quietest IPL season in recent memory, Gaikwad still finds himself as CSK's second-highest run scorer with 321 runs. Leading the charts above him is Sanju Samson, who has been CSK's most fluent and purposeful batter this season. Team form (Last 5 completed IPL matches, recent first) - GT - LWWWW | CSK - LLWWW. What to expect? Out of six games played in Ahmedabad, it is an even split with teams batting or bowling first winning three apiece. And usually, Ahmedabad has been a high-scoring venue, so one can expect another competitive game here between two power-packed teams and a lot of stakes.
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