It hasn’t been even three weeks since India were crowned T20 World Cup champions for an unprecedented third time, though it does seem like an eternity. It’s not often that India’s players go this long without being seen in competitive action of some kind or the other. But worry not. Season 19 of the Indian Premier League is imminent, with the opening fixture slated for Saturday.
The lead-up to IPL 2026 has been unusually frenetic. First hung giant question marks over whether the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium would get the nod to retain its status as the home base of Royal Challengers Bengaluru, the reigning champions. RCB’s victory over Punjab Kings in the June 3 final in Ahmedabad last year was followed by an unspeakable tragedy outside the Chinnaswamy the following evening. What was meant to be a celebratory parade turned into catastrophe as 11 fans lost their lives in a stampede. Tens of thousands gathered outside the stadium, trying to partake of a slice of history; the evening ended in tears and untold grief, the title triumph a distant memory as the horrific events hit home and an entire city was engulfed in agony and despair.
The new dispensation at the Karnataka State Cricket Association, helmed by former India pacer Venkatesh Prasad, has worked tirelessly to secure necessary permissions from the State government after meeting the short-term goals outlined by a one-man commission appointed by the government to probe the disaster. Long-term requirements will be addressed once the IPL is done with; RCB’s passionate fans, who snapped up tickets for the opener against Sunrisers Hyderabad within four minutes of the start of the exclusively online sale on Tuesday, will, however, get to see their stars in action for only five of the seven designated home games, with the franchise management having earlier inked an arrangement with Chhattisgarh to play two home fixtures in Raipur.
RCB and Rajasthan Royals, the inaugural winners in 2008, will be under new managements for IPL 2027 even though both teams officially wrapped up negotiations with interested parties in the last few days. The change in ownership should technically have no bearing on how events unfold on the field over the next two months, though there have been murmurs over the timing of the completion of the process this close to the start of the tournament.
Like always, the build-up has been characterised by a slew of withdrawals and delayed entries, most of them involving overseas fast bowlers. There has been one unforced late withdrawal in the form of Ben Duckett, the England Test opener who was part of the T20 World Cup side without getting a game. The left-hander has told the Delhi Capitals management that he would like to concentrate on getting among red-ball runs ahead of the international season after a disastrous time at the Ashes in Australia over the winter. Why he chose to wait this long before baring his hand is the big question; like his white-ball captain Harry Brook last season, Duckett will be banned from the IPL for a couple of years, an eventuality that doesn’t seem to have prevented him from making his eleventh-hour call.
Injury woes
Among those missing in action this year will be England all-rounder Sam Curran, who picked up a groin injury during the T20 World Cup, and Nathan Ellis, the Australian pacer out with a severe hamstring injury. Rajasthan Royals and Chennai Super Kings have already snapped up replacements, Dasun Shanaka and Spencer Johnson respectively, both recruited from the Pakistan Super League which began on Thursday.
The venerated Australian pace trio of Test and One-Day International captain Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood will miss the early part of the competition. Cummins hasn’t played competitively since the third Ashes Test in Adelaide in mid-December, laid low by a back injury that prevented him from playing the T20 World Cup. The SRH captain has linked up with his team in Bengaluru but will continue his return-to-play protocol as the 2016 champions begin their campaign under stand-in skipper Ishan Kishan. The left-handed Jharkhandi’s elevation to the captaincy in only his second season with the franchise, if only on a temporary basis, comes on the back of his inspirational leadership that carried his State to the T20 Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy last year, and following a wonderful run at the World Cup that helped him finish as India’s second highest run-scorer in the tournament, behind Sanju Samson. Kishan at the helm means at least at the start of the tournament, all 10 teams will be led by Indians.
Samson-Jadeja switch
Samson, meanwhile, is one of many high-profile names to have ended long-standing associations with a franchise to move to a different outfit. Having represented Rajasthan Royals for 11 seasons (2013-2015 and 2018-2025, the franchise was suspended in 2016 and 2017), he was traded out to Chennai Super Kings in the closed season.
Sanju Samson will be turning out for CSK this season.
| Photo Credit:
R. RAGU
The five-time former champions were compelled to release Curran, now unavailable, and Ravindra Jadeja, who briefly led CSK in 2022, to Rajasthan. For Jadeja, it will be a homecoming of sorts; he shot to prominence in the inaugural season when unfancied Rajasthan went all the way under the charismatic, tactically astute Shane Warne, who anointed Jadeja a ‘Rockstar’. The late Warne must be delighted at the strides Jadeja has taken in the sport, and his current standing as one of India’s most solid Test batters, a welcome development after the Test side lost two of its most experienced names in Rohit Sharma and his predecessor as captain, Virat Kohli.
Onus on RoKo
Rohit and Kohli will be the cynosure for obvious reasons. Retired internationally from the five-day game and the hustle and bustle of the 20-over format, they only play for the country in 50-over cricket. Both played their last representative games on January 18, in the last of three ODIs against New Zealand in Indore; Rohit was dismissed for 11 but Kohli smashed 124, his 54th ton in that version taking him to 85 international centuries. Rohit, who will turn 39 midway through the IPL, is looking the fittest he has been in a long time while Kohli’s dedication to taking care of his body is as legendary as his attention to detail when it comes to batting. Alongside Mahendra Singh Dhoni, they will remain the poster boys of IPL 2026, never mind the grand successes enjoyed in recent times by T20I World Cup-winning skipper Suryakumar Yadav, Samson, Kishan, Abhishek Sharma, Hardik Pandya, Tilak Varma and the magical Jasprit Bumrah.
For the early part of the tournament, Bumrah will have to keep the flag of fast bowling flying high. Starc, who was such a key performer for Delhi Capitals last season, is waiting for Cricket Australia’s nod so that he can link up with his colleagues — he doesn’t have an injury problem as such — while Hazlewood’s return from injury, too, is being closely monitored by his country’s cricket board. With 22 wickets, Hazlewood was one of the undisputed stars for RCB, who ended a 17-year wait for a title last year. As if Hazlewood’s unavailability during the initial stages wasn’t bad enough, RCB will have to do without the services of left-arm swing bowler Yash Dayal, battling personal issues, for the entire season. Despite his troubles, the Uttar Pradesh pacer was retained by the franchise in what Mo Bobat, director of cricket, said was a show of support. Perhaps anticipating that Dayal might not be available, RCB made a couple of shrewd like-for-like purchases at the Abu Dhabi auction, but there is no denying the fact that they will be the poorer for Dayal’s absence.
The differently prepared pitches at the World Cup did not facilitate unfettered ball-bashing, and that’s what the bowlers will be hoping is the case at the IPL too. Before the tournament began last month, expectations of 300 being breached were huge; as it turned out, India’s 256 for four against Zimbabwe in Chennai in the Super Eights turned out to be the highest score of the World Cup. Now, 300 is again being spoken of in hushed tones. The magical number hasn’t yet been attained in the IPL, but only a brave man will assert that it won’t be threatened, or surpassed, this time around.
One of the more frequently used cliches in 20-over cricket is that while matches can’t be won in the PowerPlay, they can certainly be lost in that first chunk of six overs. That might be the general truth, but when a team clatters to 92 without loss in the PowerPlay, like India did in the World Cup final against a shell-shocked New Zealand, the result is pretty much a foregone conclusion with 85% of the match still to be played. India’s battering rams on that occasion were Abhishek, who shed a horrible trot with an 18-ball fifty, and Samson. There are numerous such bruising pairs in the IPL, foremost among them Abhishek and Travis Head for SRH and another all-left combine, Yashasvi Jaiswal and Vaibhav Suryavanshi for RR.
RR opener Vaibhav Suryavanshi could take the game away in a jiffy.
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FILE PHOTO: R.V. MOORTHY
Since his sensational debut as a 14-year-old last season when he smashed the second-fastest IPL century ever (35 balls), Suryavanshi has gone from strength to strength. The piece de resistance was at the under-19 World Cup final against England in Harare last month, when he smashed 175 off just 80 balls and reduced the title clash to one-way traffic. Even at this tender age, Suryavanshi is well aware that the novelty factor has worn off, that teams have a better understanding of how to bowl to him, and that the second season when a player is a marked individual is a far more daunting proposition than the first. Suryavanshi turns 15 today (March 27), which makes him eligible to represent the senior Indian team. To play for the country is his dream, like it is for anyone who embraces any sport; the next few weeks will provide a greater understanding of the strides the man-child has made in the 12 months since he exploded into public consciousness with his mesmeric century against Gujarat Titans.
So much to look forward to, as ever. As the tournament progresses, there might appear to be a touch of sameness to the matches, but there will be no dimming of intensity from the players or interest from the fans. The annual showstopper is here; strap in for a roller-coaster ride like no other.