Mumbai Indians (MI) will begin the race for their sixth IPL title on Sunday, March 29, 2026, when they welcome Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) at the Wankhede Stadium in the second match of IPL 2026. Hardik Pandya is captaining MI, who are looking to win their first title since 2020, while Ajinkya Rahane is the captain of KKR, who are aiming to win their fourth title after their 2024 triumph.
**Venue**: Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai
**Time**: 7:30 PM IST
**Broadcast**: Star Sports Network
**Streaming**: JioHotstar (subscription required)
**Head-to-Head**: In 35 matches, MI have the upper hand, they have won 24 matches, while KKR have won 11 matches. MI have a very strong record at the Wankhede, having won 10 matches and lost 2, although KKR ended their long drought here in 2024.
**Team News**:
For MI, coach Mahela Jayawardene has confirmed that **Will Jacques** and **Mitchell Santner** will miss the opening match due to extended leave due to personal reasons. **Jasprit Bumrah** is completely fit. It is expected that Rohit Sharma will open with Quinton de Kock or Ryan Rickenton. **MI’s Probable XI**: Rohit Sharma, Quinton de Kock/Ryan Rickenton, Tilak Verma, Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya (captain), Sherfane Rutherford, Naman Dheer, Deepak Chahar, Trent Boult, Jasprit Bumrah, Allah Ghazanfar.
KKR’s fast bowling attack has weakened: **Harshit Rana** and **Aakash Deep** are out (replaced by: Navdeep Saini, Saurabh Dubey). **Blessing Muzarabani** has joined the team in place of Mustafizur Rahman, while **Mathisha Pathirana** will miss the initial matches due to injury.
**KKR’s Probable XI**: Finn Allen, Ajinkya Rahane (captain), Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Cameron Green, Rinku Singh, Ramandeep Singh, Sunil Narine, Rachin Ravindra, Vaibhav Arora, Varun Chakravarthy, Kartik Tyagi.
**Key Players**: Jasprit Bumrah’s bowling with the new ball, Suryakumar Yadav’s tremendous form, and Cameron Green (playing against his old team) will play a key role in this match.
**Wankhede Pitch Report**: This red clay pitch provides good bounce and has proved to be beneficial for the batsmen due to short boundaries, which often leads to big scores. There may be some seam movement in the ball in the beginning, but later due to dew (increasing humidity) it may become easier to bat in the second innings. Teams would prefer to bowl first after winning the toss; The average score here remains around 195+.
MI is the favorite team for this match on its home ground, but considering the depth of KKR’s batting, it is expected to be a tough contest.
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