Delhi Capitals skipper Axar Patel won the toss and elected to bowl first against Royal Challengers Bengaluru in their Indian Premier League 2026 match at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Saturday.
Both teams have fielded unchanged XIs for the contest.
“I am going to bowl first. The wicket looks nice and hard. Since it’s a day game, it might be a bit slow. Also, Chinnaswamy is usually a chasing ground, so we would like to chase. That’s why we decided to bowl first. We are going with the same XI. (On having a long break) If you’re winning, the break would be bad. But since we lost the last two matches, the break helped us regroup. Now we are back together as a unit and ready to start with fresh momentum. Obviously we are looking at the opposition but we are focusing on our own strengths and sticking to our plans. We'll follow our plans and see what happens,” said Delhi Capitals skipper Axar Patel.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru skipper Rajat Patidar said he was content with batting first.
“I am happy because we wanted to bat first. We'll look to post a good total on the board. We have this (green) jersey to encourage. We are playing with the same side,” he said.
The match marks a milestone for RCB as it is their 100th IPL game at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium. Despite back-to-back defeats, Delhi Capitals have retained their playing combination.
Virat Kohli has been included in the RCB XI despite recent fitness concerns, while the defending champions have been in strong form this season, having lost just one of their five matches so far.
Teams:
Royal Challengers Bengaluru: Virat Kohli, Phil Salt, Devdutt Padikkal, Rajat Patidar (capt), Jitesh Sharma (wk), Tim David, Romario Shepherd, Krunal Pandya, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Suyash Sharma, Josh Hazlewood.
Delhi Capitals: KL Rahul (wk), Pathum Nissanka, Sameer Rizvi, Axar Patel (capt), David Miller, Tristan Stubbs, Auqib Nabi, Lungi Ngidi, Kuldeep Yadav, T Natarajan, Mukesh Kumar.