For their final home outing of the season, Chennai Super Kings have taken the slightly unusual call of batting first after winning the toss at Chepauk—something no captain had done here in IPL 2026 until today. Ruturaj Gaikwad said the surface looked on the dry side and that the absence of evening dew tipped the scales. More importantly, there was a short answer about MS Dhoni. As Gaikwad put it, Dhoni wasn’t “fit enough” to take the field, even though the veteran keeper made the trip and spent the warm-ups chatting with team-mates.
Dhoni’s continued absence created room for one change. Left-arm spinner Akeal Hosein replaced seamer Gurjapneet Singh, a move Ambati Rayudu labelled “sensible on a used Chepauk pitch”, while Mitchell McClenaghan joked the decision would look brave only if Hosein struck early. Either way, Chennai’s spin-heavy approach feels in keeping with both venue and occasion.
Sunrisers Hyderabad roll in after a week’s break, their last memory an 86-all-out collapse in Ahmedabad. Skipper Pat Cummins has resisted the urge to ring the alarm bells; the XI is virtually unchanged. Victory tonight would guarantee SRH, and by extension Gujarat Titans, a place in the play-offs. A loss keeps the race messy.
Playing XIs
Chennai Super Kings: Sanju Samson (wk), Ruturaj Gaikwad (capt), Urvil Patel, Kartik Sharma, Dewald Brevis, Shivam Dube, Prashant Veer, Akeal Hosein, Anshul Kamboj, Spencer Johnson, Noor Ahmad. Impact subs: Mukesh Choudhary, Matt Short, Sarfaraz Khan, Aman Khan, Gurjapneet Singh.
Sunrisers Hyderabad: Abhishek Sharma, Ishan Kishan (wk), Heinrich Klaasen, R Smaran, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Salil Arora, Pat Cummins (capt), Praful Hinge, Shivang Kumar, Eshan Malinga, Sakib Hussain. Impact subs: Travis Head, Aniket Verma, Liam Livingstone, Harsh Dubey, Harshal Patel.
The equation is straightforward: CSK need points to keep their season alive; SRH have a buffer but would prefer to sort qualification on their own terms. The Chepauk crowd, Dhoni sightings or no Dhoni sightings, rarely needs extra motivation, so expect the usual din once the first ball is bowled.
