Six-hitting is often treated as the main currency in T20 cricket, yet Thursday night’s contest at the Wankhede Stadium felt like an exception. Mumbai Indians managed 11 maximums against Punjab Kings’ nine, but it was Punjab who dominated the result—PBKS chased with control and ultimately cruised to victory with 21 balls to spare.
Four batters—two from each side—reached scores of 50 or more. Among them, Prabhsimran Singh struck the fewest sixes (just two). Even so, he produced the stand-out strike rate of the quartet, finishing at 205.12.
Prabhsimran’s unbeaten 39-ball 80 was a rare kind of innings. At its core was command: he successfully managed a chase of a slightly under-par Mumbai Indians total in conditions that typically suit the team batting second. He executed his plan with near precision, highlighted by a major slice of luck when Jasprit Bumrah dropped a sitter while Prabhsimran was on 11. His control was reflected in his “control percentage”, which sat at nearly 90—the best again among the four batters who made it past fifty.
There was high control, and for the most part an avoidance of big aerial shots. Still, Prabhsimran’s scoring rate barely ever dipped beneath 200.
In many ways, the innings resembled Sanju Samson’s unbeaten 97 in India’s virtual T20 World Cup quarter-final against West Indies at Eden Gardens last month. Both featured a small venue, a quick outfield and extra dew that tended to accelerate the ball. Both also came with a chase target of 196. Like Samson in that match, Prabhsimran repeatedly found the gaps and consistently extracted full value from his timing.
These were the sort of conditions that suit Prabhsimran’s style. He is a touch more traditional as a batter than PBKS’s other opener Priyansh Arya, or even Abhishek Sharma, who plays at the top alongside him. Arya and Abhishek generally keep strike rates in the 170s and tend to clear the ropes roughly once for every 1.5 fours. Prabhsimran’s strike rate sits a little under 150, and he averages one six for every 1.85 fours.
At Punjab Kings, that difference in explosiveness matters. Because Prabhsimran is less “firepower-heavy” than Arya, because he is slightly older (though not by much) and more established, and because he forms part of one of the tournament’s most intriguing batting line-ups, he is often discussed primarily as a component of an opening partnership—one cog in a larger, high-powered batting unit.
On Thursday night, the match set-up and the Wankhede conditions aligned to push Prabhsimran into the spotlight. The game was primed for someone to play an updated version of old-school batting: moving at close to two runs per ball, while sending the ball in the air only occasionally.
Prabhsimran did not find his first six until the eighth over of PBKS’s innings. One reason was that he had been underfed strike earlier—by the time the powerplay ended, he had faced only nine balls, and Punjab had reached 61 for 2. Another reason was simply the precision of his contact. From the moment he clipped the first ball he faced, Deepak Chahar, past midwicket for four, his timing looked crisp and assured.
When his first maximum finally arrived, it came with a clear statement of intent. Shardul Thakur had bowled the seventh over and conceded only eight runs, and both Prabhsimran and Shreyas Iyer had struggled to get fully settled against Thakur’s knuckle-ball deliveries angled wide of off-stump. After a first over that produced 21 runs, PBKS still managed 48 for 2 by the end of that phase.
As the middle overs began, MI may have hoped that slowing the tempo would become easier now that the field had spread further, especially with the slower ball looking like a helpful option.
That plan lasted briefly. Chahar returned for the eighth over and started with a slower ball, which Prabhsimran pulled for two.
On the next delivery, Prabhsimran stepped out of his crease. He sensed another slower ball was coming from Chahar, and the idea was to build momentum into the shot—then clear the ground. He chose the right ball, struck it with intent, and sent it sailing over wide long-off.
Chahar’s response wasn’t disastrous, but it was just a touch off line. Prabhsimran almost appeared to anticipate how the next ball would behave. Since Chahar was looking to bowl slower deliveries, the fine-leg region was positioned inside the ring. After the previous ball, Chahar likely wanted to pull his length back and come into the pitch. And because Chahar’s slower ball is an offcutter, Prabhsimran could expect something that he might be able to tuck behind the fine-leg boundary if it drifted too close to his pads.
So Prabhsimran shifted across his crease, effectively setting himself up to receive the ball where he wanted it. He used a quick, delicate glance, and the ball shot away—left of short fine leg.
Those two strikes did more than add runs; they knocked the wind out of any sense MI might have had that they could wrest control back. They also offered a glimpse of the approach that makes Prabhsimran so difficult to stop during the middle overs.
Since the start of the 2025 season, Prabhsimran has carried the fourth-highest strike rate in the middle overs (172.94) among batters who have scored at least 200 runs in that window (overs 7 to 16). Look at the names surrounding him and you’ll see the company he is keeping.
The numbers underline that Prabhsimran is not a pure six-hitter at the same level as Nicholas Pooran—though who is?—nor at the same tier as Rajat Patidar or Iyer. But, like Suryakumar Yadav, he still finds a way to pile up fours even when the field is stretched.
That ability is hugely valuable. It makes him extremely dangerous in matches like this one, where the combination of pitch conditions, the scale of the chase, and his skill set allowed him to accelerate at a rapid pace while keeping risk low compared to the typical modern T20 approach.
“I think he has certainly raised his bar, considering the last season where he was going in the powerplay, just swinging wild,” Iyer said after the match. “Even though [he was] getting runs, he was giving us excellent starts [last year], this time I feel he’s got that maturity to finish the game, and it’s great to see youngsters coming up and finishing off the games, taking the responsibility, and saying okay, I’m going to win the match for the team.
“So phenomenal player, talent, and I feel that the more matches he’s getting, he’s actually getting more and more mature.”
It was high praise from the PBKS captain, even if the timeline may have been slightly off. Prabhsimran was already on the path to becoming this kind of finisher during IPL 2025.
Once Prabhsimran got going on Thursday, MI had little answer. They didn’t set a large enough target to begin with, and many of their bowlers looked out of sync. Still, it’s hard to imagine the contest turning into something less one-sided without an innings of Prabhsimran’s quality.
