RR Vs CSK Highlights, IPL 2026: Archer, Burger's Spells; Sooryavanshi's Power Help Royals Commence Campaign With Win

The Indian Premier League (IPL) 2026 match 3 will see Rajasthan Royals host Chennai Super Kings at the Barspara Cricket Stadium in Guwahati. Ahead of that, we welcome you to our live coverage of the match, Stay tuned for score updates, toss updates, playing XI and everything else about the match.

Sanju Samson, who spent nearly a decade as the face of the Rajasthan Royals and led them to a final, is making his Chennai debut tonight as their primary wicketkeeper-batter.

Ravindra Jadeja, who is often synonymous with CSK’s success over the last 12 years, is returning to the Rajasthan Royals—the very team where his IPL journey began as an underdog back in 2008

Chennai Super Kings will start their 2026 campaign without MS Dhoni, who is ruled out of tonight’s match due to a calf injury. The veteran wicketkeeper sustained the muscle strain during a pre-season training session.

While the CSK medical staff has not confirmed a return date, the injury is a significant blow to the team's tactical core.

The last time MS Dhoni missed an IPL match for Chennai Super Kings was April 26, 2019, when he sat out a game against Mumbai Indians due to a fever. Since that 2019 miss, Dhoni had played 93 consecutive matches for the franchise. In his nearly two-decade IPL career, he has missed only five games in total for CSK

The Rajasthan Royals Vs Chennai Super Kings IPL 2026 match live telecast will be available on the Star Sports Network channels. Fans can get live streaming of the match on the JioHotstar mobile app and website.

The biggest talking point of the 2026 off-season was the confirmed transfer of Sanju Samson from Rajasthan Royals to Chennai Super Kings. The move ended Samson’s long-standing association with the Rajasthan franchise, where he served as both captain and their primary batting mainstay

Chennai Super Kings signed Samson for INR 18 crore to take over as their primary wicketkeeper and opening batter. To make the deal work, Rajasthan brought back Ravindra Jadeja—who started his career with the Royals in 2008—along with all-rounder Sam Curran.

Shane Watson leads the highest run scorer charts with 711 runs. He is a unique figure in this rivalry, having scored centuries for both franchises (one for RR in 2013 and one for CSK in 2018).

Ravindra Jadeja holds the top spot for wicket takers with 21 wickets. Interestingly, he will be playing for Rajasthan Royals in tonight's match after his high-profile trade from Chennai.

Reports suggest that it has been rather gloomy with heavy cloud cover at the Barsapara Stadium in Guwahati and it has started raining. The covers have come on. It will be a matter to see if the toss starts on time. Here is our weather report for the game.

Fortunately for the fans, the rain has now stopped and the covers have also come off. It is expected that the toss will go as scheduled and there won't be any change in timings.

The Barsapara Cricket Stadium (also known as the Dr. Bhupen Hazarika Stadium) has earned a reputation as one of India’s most explosive batting venues. For tonight’s RR vs CSK season opener, the conditions are expected to follow this high-scoring trend, though recent weather may add a tactical twist.

The pitch is traditionally flat with true pace and consistent bounce, allowing batters to trust the surface and play through the line. The ball typically comes onto the bat nicely, making it a paradise for stroke-makers. Due to recent rain in Guwahati, the pitch has spent significant time under covers. This moisture, combined with evening humidity, may offer early swing and seam movement for the first 3–4 overs.

The toss has been delayed to 7:05 IST to give the groundsmen a little more time to prepare the ground conditions following the rain that took place a little while ago. No covers in place now.

Toss Update: Rajasthan Royals captain Riyan Parag has won the toss and has opted to field first.

Chennai Super Kings: Sanju Samson, Ruturaj Gaikwad(c), Ayush Mhatre, Matthew Short, Shivam Dube, Kartik Sharma(w), Jamie Overton, Noor Ahmad, Matt Henry, Anshul Kamboj, Khaleel Ahmed

Rajasthan Royals: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Riyan Parag(c), Dhruv Jurel(w), Shimron Hetmyer, Ravindra Jadeja, Jofra Archer, Nandre Burger, Sandeep Sharma, Ravi Bishnoi, Brijesh Sharma

A brilliant delivery from Nandre Burger and Sanju Samson departs cheaply in his CSK debut. Burger uses the left arm angle, the ball pitches and seams away while Samson plays the line. Gets his offstump clattered and Burger celebrates. Samson was beaten all ends up and Rajasthan Royals strike early. Some quality bowling on display from the South African.

Chaos at the Barsapara Stadium as CSK land in early trouble. The ball has been seaming off the wicket and that made Ruturaj Gaikwad make room to hit Jofra Archer on the off-side. Archer went really full and wrecked the furniture of Gaikwad. Next over Ayush Mhatre faced Nandre Burger and fends a nippy bouncer. The ball takes a brush off the gloves and Dhruv Jurel takes an easy catch. Although umpire was unmoved first, DRS shows a spike. CSK bring in-form Sarfaraz Khan as an impact sub. He is one of the earliest impact subs of the IPL ever.

After a period of struggle, Matt Short also joins the dismissed batters. Tries to break free of the pressure that was building over him and miscues a delivery from Sandeep Sharma straight to the hands of the mid-on fielder. It was a nervy innings from the get go and he never looked confident. Kartik Sharma comes in and shows his ability by hitting the first six of IPL career against Ravi Bishnoi.

Ravindra Jadeja's face off against his former side ended up to be lopsided as he scalped two wickets in the same over. First he trapped Sarfaraz Khan LBW after the latter missed a sweep against him. Then Shivam Dube hits him for a six on his first ball. Two balls later, Jadeja goes wide, lets him fetch the ball and this time Dube' shot finds the long-off fielder due to lack of a good connection. CSK are on the floor here and that was some poor batting by Dube.

Chennai Super Kings are finding no ways to break free from the shackles. After two quiet overs, Noor Ahmad looked to take on the bowlers, but he remained unsuccessful. Parag brought back Jofra Archer into the attack and Noor charged at him to play an inside out shot. Only got an outside edge which carried to the hands of wicketkeeper Dhruv Jurel. Earlier, debutant Kartik Sharma was trapped by Brijesh Sharma. RR keep on chipping in wickets.

Once again after two quiet overs another wicket goes down. This time it was a soft dismissal. Ravi Bishnoi's ball gripped and turned into the body of Matt Henry who wanted to gently push it. Played the shot too early and the push went to the bowler while being lofted. Bishnoi took a good catch and that was the end of Matt Henry. CSK have only one wicket remaining.

19 runs in 14 balls between Sarfaraz Khan and Matthew Short for the fourth wicket was the biggest partnership for CSK before Jamie Overton and Kartik Sharma's 7th wicket partnership of 17 runs. Overton has been involved in four stands along with Kartik, Noor, Henry and Kamboj. Overton keeps rotating the strike and ticking the scoreboard as he enters the final over with the team's score at 117/9. The chaos at the other end has not made Overton flinch as he takes the game deep.

So far, the highest 10th-wicket partnership for Chennai CSK in the IPL was 26 runs, shared between MS Dhoni and Mohit Sharma. This record was set during the IPL 2013 Final against Mumbai Indians at the Eden Gardens.

The record gets broken as Jamie Overton and Anshul Kamboj stitches a partnership of 33 runs to take CSK to 127. This is now the highest 10th wicket partnership for CSK in IPL. Jamie Overton wanted to take strike and went for a non-existing second run, getting run out.

Six bowlers bowled for RR in this innings and each one of them scalped a wicket. Jofra Archer's 2/19 the best figures. 11 runs, in the fourth by burger, was the most expensive over, and the CSK innings saw only two 10-run overs (7th, by Bishnoi; 19th, by burger)

The PBKS vs KKR match from IPL 2025 has indicated that low chases can be quite tricky sometimes. But Vaibhav Sooryavanshi is making sure that it is not the case for Rajasthan Royals in this match. He survived twice in two overs. First, Kartik Sharma dropped his catch in the first over and then he survived an LBW call in Khaleel Ahmed's over. Despite that he hit back at Khaleel by lofting him over covers.

Exceptional striking from Vaibhav Sooryavanshi and he gets to his fifty in just 15 balls. It is the joint third-fastest half-century in the history of IPL. He has absolutely cracked down on Noor Ahmed and hit him for two sixes in a row to get to his half-century. RR are looking strongly on course to chase down the target.

Chennai Super Kings have been trying to put up a fight riding on Anshul Kamboj. He is the one to cause some trouble to the batters. First got Vaibhav Sooryavanshi out in the off-side through a brilliant catch of Sarfaraz Khan. Then foxed Dhruv Jurel attempting a ramp shot to drag one to the stumps. Despite the wickets, boundaries keep coming and RR are now touching distance away from victory.

An emphatic victory for Riyan Parag and his side and they register first points on the table. Some sensational ball-striking from Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, followed by Yashasvi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel and Riyan Parag. They make light work of the chase of 128 runs as they reach there with 47 balls to spare. CSK, meanwhile, will be very disappointed with their performance, specially with the bat. Conditions were difficult in the first half of the innings but they didn't really apply themselves with the bat.

Nandre Burger is named the player of the match for his spell of 2/26 in four overs. He picked the big wickets of Sanju Samson and Ayush Mhatre which set up RR's win.

"(Frustrated?) Not much, to be honest. I felt the conditions at the start were really tough, especially when facing Jofra and Burger. They bowled brilliant lengths and even after that, to a medium-pacer it was slightly tough. You could see even the spinners were getting some assistance as well. Yes, we would have been better in batting, we would have taken the game deep, showed some batsmanship, maybe take the game till 150-160. But, nowadays, you never know what's a good score, so you just have to keep going. So I think it just one of those days where the wicket was slightly on the tougher side. So not frustrated at all. (Do you reassess as a group?) You just put it behind and move on. We've got a game in another three days. Make sure that everyone is in a good headspace. One good thing is, a lot of youngsters in the group. So, probably a nervy start for everyone, but good to get a game behind and good to start with lot of mistakes. Hopefully it will be just improvement after here. I'm someone who's not a firm believer of going all the way. But, with the impact player, you never really know what's the good score or what's the par score. So you don't really often see games going down the line till the 20th over when you're defending 150, 160 or 170. So I think it's just about backing yourself, backing your game for the batsmen. If you have it in your area, just make sure you go for it. Today it didn't work but we can be better in batsmanship. You just have to be positive, especially when you're batting first. If conditions are good, you never know, the same batting line-up can put a good score."

" I didn’t really do anything outside - there was supposed to be a cake cutting, but I went to sleep early to avoid the cake-smearing (on how he celebrated his birthday). The plan today was simply to execute well in the powerplay - initially the wicket felt a bit sticky, but as the ball got older, it started coming onto the bat nicely (on his batting approach). I do think about defence, but today our plan was to control the game in the powerplay because in a small chase, that phase is crucial - if the bowling team does well there, the game can tilt their way, but our powerplay went really well (on his aggressive intent). The coaches didn’t specifically say that bowlers would attack me - everyone else was already saying that - but they just told me that they back me and that I should stick to my natural game and play according to the situation (on guidance from the support staff). My opening partner (Jaiswal) keeps communicating with me after every ball - he tells me when to take singles, keeps giving me the strike, and encourages me to keep playing my shots if the ball is coming nicely onto the bat (on partnership understanding)."

"I got lucky with the toss. We knew that the moisture was going to play a part. Everyone executed their plans. A lot of prep has gone into it. The goal this year to win the trophy. We want to be a team that wants to play smart cricket. Brijesh, what he did was insane. What I tell him (Vaibhav) is he's going to play 14 games. He goes and does something like that. Really happy to have him in my team. Dhruv comes in at three, Hettie at five. Hopefully we win with this batting line-up."

Chennai Super Kings play Punjab Kings next on April 03, Friday.

Rajasthan Royals play Gujarat Titans next on April 04, Saturday.