Mumbai: The business end of the IPL brings a certain heaviness: teams near their goal, failures can be defining and success has a special ring to it. Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) versus Gujarat Titans (GT) will be excited ahead of the first Qualifier but they’ll also feel the tension.
Even though Tuesday’s RCB versus Gujarat Titans faceoff isn’t as critical as a knockout round – the loser gets another shot in Qualifier 2 – these are the two best teams in the tournament, playing for the final. Only twice before in the current playoff structure have teams outside the top 2 on the points table lifted the trophy.
The two sides come with different playing modules, yet similar franchise philosophies, where the owners let the coaches do their thing. On the playing front, no team quite matches GT; they are still playing, on paper, an old-school brand of T20 cricket. Yet, here they are; equals among the more flashy, the more stats-driven sides.
Both teams have been dominant at home, the oldest cheat code to topping the table. RCB (6-1) have done better than GT (5-2) on this front, despite playing at two home venues – Bengaluru and Raipur. Playing at the high altitude venue, the teams know exactly what to expect – plenty of boundaries, less spin. If the bowlers decide the course of the game, it will be through pace.
Here again, the two sides are equals. If GT have Kagiso Rabada and Mohammed Siraj, RCB have Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Josh Hazlewood. GT will most certainly try to bowl their leading pacers through the Powerplay. Virat Kohli will try to defy their plans. RCB fans who are believers in serendipity will hope Phil Salt can join ranks at the top. Salt has returned after treating his injured finger in England. Similarly, last year, he had to leave his side to go home for different reasons, but came back to lift the trophy.
The news from Dharamsala, however, is that Salt is still being treated. If he can’t make it back, Venkatesh Iyer can slot in at the top, having scored briskly against SRH in their last game. For Iyer, this can be a year of redemption, after enduring a season of low scores for KKR under the pressure of his price tag.
Similarly, Bhuvneshwar and Hazlewood will be up against the most consistent top order in the league. Shubman Gill, Sai Sudharsan and Jos Buttler have faced 67% balls in the league phase and managed 69% of their runs.
Bowling teams have known this since last season, yet more often than not, they are unable to foil their plans. To watch these early exchanges alone across both innings, where the best all-format bowlers run in to deny the best all-format batters further lifts the scale of the high-stakes battle.
“It goes to show, if you are technically and mentally strong, you can change your game according to the format,” GT assistant coach Vijay Dahiya said about their strong top-three on match eve.
“Virat Kohli has done that more than anyone else,” he added about his ex-Ranji teammate.
Kohli has batted faster than ever before (SR 164) over a season, even while notching up another 550-plus run season and counting. Through his interviews, the former RCB captain has been expressing some angst at the national think-tank over being constantly judged. He would know, he has to walk the talk. Then again, haven’t we seen it before; Kohli and throwing punches, they go hand in hand.
At the other end of the scale, the India star-in-the-making Gill has a point to prove too. At the prime of his career, he was told by the national selectors, he wasn’t good enough to be in India’s best World Cup 15. Gill, too, is going at his fastest strike rate (162) across an IPL season. If ever there was merit in batting through phases at a high rate being as vital as winning phases with complete belligerence, this is Gill’s chance to show in a title winning campaign.
GT has a strong chance, given their track record ever since they entered the IPL ring in 2022. They have reached the playoffs in four seasons out of five, twice made the final, once winning the whole thing. A weak middle order or not, they win more than they lose. By and large, they have showcased the ability to deal with big match pressure.
For RCB, their recent success has been down to this year and the last. 2025 was epochal. Winning again is uniquely difficult in sport. That’s what the men in red are aiming for, with their new owners watching.
