Virat Kohli’s trophy cabinet is complete as RCB lift first IPL title with win over Punjab Kings

Ahmedabad: Finally, ‘King Kohli’ can live the dream. An agonising 18-year wait ended here on Tuesday night for RCB and Virat Kohli, made possible by some excellent middle-overs bowling and of, course, another vital contribution from the bat of Kohli himself.

Punjab, meanwhile, have to admit they choked under the arclights and their wait for the IPL trophy now continues.

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When RCB were on the field, the star of the show was left-arm spinner Krunal Pandya (4-0-17-2), who strangled the life out of Punjab’s 191-run chase in the middle overs. The pressure of a chase in the final saw PBKS crumble, and the eventual six-run margin of the win offers no indication that the final was one-sided for large parts of Punjab’s chase. The result was almost a foregone conclusion.



Kings’ pursuit began in earnest manner with edges from Priyansh Arya (24) and Prabhsimran Singh (26) sandwiched between some good shots. PBKS ended the powerplay at 52/1. The strangle began afterwards.


With boundaries drying up and strike rotation minimal, Prabhsimran’s attempt to hit Krunal as he sliced a simple catch to point. In a pivotal moment in the game, captain Shreyas Iyer (1) was caught behind trying to guide a ball to third man off Romario Shepherd, and the life went out of Punjab’s innings.

Southpaw Nehal Wadhera played a painstaking innings (15 off 18 balls) and Josh Inglis’s attempt to hit Krunal out of the park was unsuccessful.

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Only a whirlwind innings from Shashank Singh (61 off 30b; 3x4, 6x6), which included a 22-run last over bowled by Josh Hazlewood, momentarily had RCB on the backfoot, but it was too little too late.



Earlier, after being invited to bat first, meaningful contributions from all batters took RCB to a competitive 190/9. With the innings lacking momentum and Kohli also failing to up the ante, Liam Livingstone (25 off 15b; 2x6) smashed Yuzvendra Chahal for six over long-off in the 13th over while Kohli too flicked him to the deep midwicket for a boundary.

It seemed as though the floodgates would open, but the PBKS bowlers kept RCB on a tight leash. Kohli’s cautions compiling of runs, as it turned out, was the right approach on the day.