IPL 2026 Week 1 Reactions: Sunrisers beat KKR, Cooper Connolly stars & Delhi's bowling craft

In this episode of the show, Stu and Raj discuss the first week of IPL 2026, focusing on the things that reinforced their pre-tournament views and the things that have surprised them so far. We start the show with another shout out to Amelia Kerr, after her stunning 179* guided the White Ferns to a record-breaking chase against South Africa, before moving on to the IPL coverage and the most recent match between Sunrisers Hyderabad and the Kolkata Knight Riders.. For SRH, it was a story of two innings on the batting side of things, with the Travishek combo of Abhishek Sharma and Travis Head getting them off to a flyer, before a flurry of wickets meant Heinrich Klaasen and Nitish Kumar Reddy had to rebuild, but they did it in fine style. With the ball, run outs proved to be the most important factor, as we talk about some positive signs from Nitish Kumar Reddy & Angkrish Raghuvanshi and the pressure starting to build on Cameron Green. As we start to look back to the week that was, it's Cooper Connolly who takes centre stage after he starred in Punjab's win against Gujarat. We examine why people are so excited about his potential, and what this means for the PBKS season. Next, attention turns to the Rajasthan v CSK game, which saw Nandre Burger & Jofra Archer blast out the CSK top order before Vaibhav Suryavanshi and a moustachioed Yashasvi Jaiswal made light work of the chase. Are RR better than we expected? Or are the Chennai Super Kings fans in for a tough, tough season? The Delhi Capitals bowlers are the next group to receive praise from the Top Order team, after their performance against LSG. Lungi Ngidi's slower ball, Kuldeep Yadav's trickery and Axar Patel's craft all played a huge role in knocking off the LSG firepower before an impressive partnership from Sameer Rizvi and Tristan Stubbs saw them home. To round out the show, we highlight strong starts from RCB and the Mumbai Indians, who look set to challenge for the title yet again in 2026 with Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma & Ryan Rickelton all looking in top form. We'll be back in your feed again in another week or so with more cricket news, including plenty of IPL news and the upcoming NZ tours. Until then please take the time to give us a like, follow, share or

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IPL 2026 Week 1 Reactions: Sunrisers beat KKR, Cooper Connolly stars & Delhi's bowling craft is an episode from The Top Order Cricket Podcast by The Top Order Podcast.

This episode is 43:58 long.

This episode was published on Apr 2, 2026.

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