Another bad news coming in from Raipur for Kolkata Knight Riders. The rain has stopped and the covers are slowly getting removed. However, the pitch inspection will be taking place at 8:15 PM. Fingers crossed for them as they are hoping to get a full game. 

"Hot, humidity and the odd thunderstorm. We just had one, and the guys [groundstaff] over are cleaning up and waiting for us, so we'd better hurry up. 65,400 get into this cricket stadium, and it is the fourth largest in the world. Now, the pitch just a few days ago, RCB played their first game, it was a little bit up and down. Aaron Finch was there watching. He's here with us now. What do you make of the surface today, Finchy? Well, it's a different wicket. This has never been used in an IPL or an international game. It's pitch number four, but it looks very, very similar to what we saw in the previous game, which was a 160 chase and chased down. If Spider[cam] comes down with me here, you can see all of these cracks, but you can see some cross-crack, and that's where you start to get the up and down bounce. And when you look back to the previous game, 14 of the 15 wickets were taken by the quicks," Nick Knight and Aaron Finch.

The rain has slowed down a bit the official confirmation is also out and the toss is delayed. The ground is completely under covers and the players are still in their respective dressing rooms. 

The Bengaluru batting unit was a pale shadow of its fear-inducing self against Mumbai Indians while chasing a middling 167 here in Raipur. They needed a determined half-century from Krunal Pandya and a six in the fourth ball of the final over from Bhuvneshwar Kumar to chase that down.

The Ajinkya Rahane-led team had a disastrous first half but managed to stay alive with wins in last four games after losing six in a row. They still have a game in hand compared to other teams and can reach a maximum of 17 points which may be enough for qualification. However, if today's match gets washed out, then KKR will be all but out from the Playoffs race. 

Uh-ho! As we were speaking about the ground being under covers, it started raining again in Raipur. However, there's no official confirmation regarding the toss. 

A worrying news coming in from Raipur that the ground is under covers. It was raining a few hours ago and the covers are up as a safety measure. However, it's not raining right now and the toss is expected to play at the scheduled time. 

Royal Challengers Bengaluru will require a significantly punchier batting effort to overcome Kolkata Knight Riders' in-form bowling unit and close in on an IPL playoffs berth. RCB are currently perched atop the points table with 14 points, but they will lose that spot to either Sunrisers Hyderabad or Gujarat Titans, who also have 14 points.

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the IPL 2026 match between Royal Challengers Bengaluru and Kolkata Knight Riders, straight from the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh International Stadium, Raipur. Stay tuned for all the live updates.