Defending champion Royal Challengers Bangalore is ready to defend its title. This campaign of captain Rajat Patidar’s team will start from the very first match of the new IPL season. But the very first stop of the team in this journey is very difficult, where it will face Sunrisers Hyderabad full of explosive batsmen. There is a lot of curiosity and enthusiasm for this very first match of IPL 2026. This match is also going to be special because after 9 years both the teams are going to clash in the first match of the season and in these 9 years some players from both the teams have also changed sides.
The first match of IPL 2026 will be played on Saturday 28 March, in which Bengaluru and Hyderabad Will be face to face. This match will be special in many ways because for the first time RCB will take the field as champion and will face a former champion. But it is even more special because after 9 years, an IPL season will start with the match between RCB and SRH. Earlier, the IPL 2017 season had started with the clash between these two teams.
Swap of these players of RCB-SRH
This was the same season when SRH was playing as the defending champion because in the previous season, Hyderabad had won the title by defeating Bengaluru in the final. This time the story has changed and RCB is taking the field as a champion team. But this is not the only change that has taken place, but in these 9 years, some changes have also taken place in both the teams and those too are not minor changes.
In fact, in the match played in 2017, star batsman Travis Head was also included in the playing-11 of Bengaluru, while veteran fast bowler Bhuvneshwar Kumar was on the field for Hyderabad. But now after 9 years, Head will start the season for SRH while Bhuvneshwar will start the season for RCB.
Another special thing is that in that match, none of the players who were in the playing-11 of both the teams, except Head and Bhuvneshwar, will be a part of this match. This is because Virat Kohli could not play in that match and Shane Watson captained RCB. However, Head and Bhuvneshwar will also play for different teams.
Who won that match?
Talking about the result of the match, SRH had won that match very easily. In that match, SRH, batting first, scored 207 runs. For that, Yuvraj Singh had scored 62 runs in just 27 balls. In response, Bengaluru’s innings was reduced to just 172 runs. Travis Head had scored 30 runs. Virat Kohli was not a part of that match. Bhuvneshwar had taken 2 wickets.