IPL 2024 - As it happened - Rain denies RR a shot at top-two finish

Right, the final league game in IPL 2024 has been washed out without a ball being bowled. SRH stay second and will face table-toppers KKR in the first qualifier while third-placed RR will run into a red-hot RCB side in the Eliminator.

Oops, the rain has returned to Guwahati, and the covers are back in place. Spare a thought for these Riyan Parag fans who have braved the weather. ICYMI: The cut-off time for a five-over shootout is 10.56pm.

With the rain threat still looming, KKR choose to chase in a seven-overs-per-side game. KKR bring in left-arm fingerspinner Anukul Roy. RR captain Sanju Samson says he is wary of the moisture in the surface and that they've made some last-minute changes. Mitch Starc is selecting the ball for KKR. Gurbaz could play his first innings of the season for KKR. No Hetmyer yet, though, for RR. We will finally have a start at 10.45pm local time.

KKR XI: 1 Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), 2 Sunil Narine, 3 Shreyas Iyer (capt), 4 Rinku Singh, 5 Venkatesh Iyer, 6 Andre Russell, 7 Ramandeep Singh, 8 Mitchell Starc, 9 Anukul Roy, 10 Harshit Rana, 11 Varun Chakravarthy

Impact Subs bench: Vaibhav Arora, Manish Pandey, Nitish Rana, KS Bharat, Sherfane Rutherford

RR XI: 1 Yashasvi Jaiswal, 2 Tom Kohler-Cadmore, 3 Sanju Samson(capt,wk), 4 Riyan Parag, 5 Dhruv Jurel, 6 Rovman Powell, 7 R Ashwin, 8 Trent Boult, 9 Sandeep Sharma, 10 Avesh Khan, 11 Nandre Burger

Impact subs bench Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Sen, Keshav Maharaj, Shubham Dubey, Donnovan Ferreira

The covers have been peeled off and it appears like the rain has relented. Indeed, the rain has finally stopped. We will have an inspection at 10.25pm local time. How about a five-over shootout? No official update about playing conditions yet, but the toss is imminent in Guwahati.

It's still raining in Guwahati. There's some lightning too. The cut-off time for a five-over shootout is 10.56pm local time. If the weather doesn't clear up, SRH will stay second and will face table-toppers KKR in the first qualifier. RR will take on RCB in the second qualifier.

...but there's still a steady drizzle in Guwahati, keeping RR and KKR waiting.

Additional covers have been brought in. The Barsapara Stadium's drainage system isn't as good as the one at the Chinnaswamy Stadium. I can recall a tragicomic, wet evening at the Barsapara in 2020. But the facilities have improved since it officially became RR's second home in the IPL. The forecast for the night isn't promising either.

The toss should've happened by now...but rain has delayed it and the main cover is on in Guwahati. In Hyderabad, meanwhile, SRH are on track to chasing down 215 against PBKS. This means RR need to win if they are to seal a top-two spot.