The curtain is set to fall on the 2026 Indian Premier League, with the final scheduled for Sunday at Ahmedabad’s Narendra Modi Stadium. Royal Challengers Bengaluru will face Gujarat Titans in what promises to be a high-stakes contest, with several storylines riding on the result.
First on the list is the trophy itself. If RCB lift the title, they would become the third franchise in IPL history to win successive championships, following Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings. In that scenario, Rajat Patidar would join a select group of captains to achieve back-to-back title wins, becoming the third such leader after Rohit Sharma, who did it in 2019 and 2020, and Mahendra Singh Dhoni, who achieved the feat in 2010 and 2011. On the other hand, if Gujarat Titans win, it would mark their second championship—after their maiden triumph in 2022, the same year they were formed.
There will also be intense attention on individual honours, particularly the Orange Cap and the Purple Cap. Starting with the Orange Cap race, Rajasthan Royals batter Vaibhav Sooryavanshi currently leads the charts with 776 runs at a strike rate backing his average of 48.50. That puts the Bihar-born prodigy within reach of being overtaken in the season finale by Gujarat’s captain Shubman Gill and opener Sai Sudharsan. Gill would need to score 55 runs to move past Sooryavanshi, while Sudharsan requires 67 runs to take the top spot.
The scenarios are certainly plausible. It is even possible that both Gill and Sudharsan surpass Sooryavanshi and then trade positions between themselves. Gill has previously won the Orange Cap once—back in 2023—when he amassed 890 runs across the campaign. Sudharsan, meanwhile, claimed the Orange Cap last season after posting 759 runs.
Rabada vs Bhuvneshwar in the Purple Cap race
Turning to the Purple Cap, Gujarat Titans’ Kagiso Rabada sits at the top with 28 wickets. RCB’s Bhuvneshwar Kumar is just two wickets behind, keeping the contest well and truly alive ahead of the final. If both bowlers finish Sunday’s game level on wickets, Bhuvneshwar would be the favourite to win the Purple Cap due to a superior economy rate.
At present, Rabada’s economy rate stands at 9.43, while Bhuvneshwar is down at 8.00—an important margin in a title-deciding race that can come down to fine details. The stakes are further heightened by past history: Bhuvneshwar is the only bowler in IPL history to win consecutive Purple Caps for Sunrisers Hyderabad, doing it in 2016 and 2017. The 2016 season was also the year SRH went on to win the trophy.
Rabada, for his part, has already tasted Purple Cap success once before. He won the award in 2020 while representing Delhi Capitals, taking 30 wickets in the franchise’s only appearance in a final in the tournament’s history. With both contenders close to the summit, the 2026 final carries extra weight—not only for team glory, but also for these personal milestones.
