Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) won the toss and invited Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) to bat first in their Indian Premier League (IPL) 2026 clash at the Ekana cricket stadium in Lucknow on April 26.
What did the captains say at the toss?
LSG captain Rishabh Pant, after winning the toss, said:
"We're gonna bowl first, we want to again put the opposition in the back first and just find the answer as a batting group. Just one change, Linde comes in for Siddharth. Definitely we are working towards it, when there are lots of leaders in the family, you have to find a way and we are pretty close to finding ways and we gotta just stick together, stay tight, because we know that we can turn around the season from here and I'm pretty confident to make it happen. See definitely any kind of confidence is definitely needed and we'll take that one too."
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Meanwhile, KKR skipper Ajinkya Rahane, after losing the toss, said:
"We were looking to bat first. At the moment it's important to see how we are playing as a team. Giving that freedom to the batting unit. Need to assess those conditions. We are going with the same team. That victory was very good. It's always about improvement. Had some good practice sessions, looking forward to the game".
Lucknow Super Giants (Playing XI):
Aiden Markram, Mitchell Marsh, Rishabh Pant(w/c), Nicholas Pooran, Ayush Badoni, Mukul Choudhary, George Linde, Mohammed Shami, Prince Yadav, Digvesh Singh Rathi, Mohsin Khan
Lucknow Super Giants Impact Subs: Himmat Singh, Akshat Raghuvanshi, Abdul Samad, Avesh Khan, Manimaran Siddharth
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Kolkata Knight Riders (Playing XI):
Ajinkya Rahane(c), Tim Seifert(w), Cameron Green, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Rovman Powell, Rinku Singh, Sunil Narine, Ramandeep Singh, Anukul Roy, Vaibhav Arora, Kartik Tyagi
Kolkata Knight Riders Impact Subs: Manish Pandey, Finn Allen, Tejasvi Singh, Navdeep Saini, Varun Chakravarthy