Kohli's unbeaten 75 carries RCB to back-to-back IPL titles
Royal Challengers Bengaluru are champions again. On Gujarat's own ground in Ahmedabad, Rajat Patidar's side chased down 156 with twelve balls to spare to win the IPL 2026 final by five wickets, becoming only the third team in the league's history to successfully defend its title.
The night belonged to Virat Kohli, who held the innings together with an unbeaten 75 from 42 deliveries and finished the job with a six in the 18th over. It was the second IPL crown of his career and a second in a row for the franchise he has carried for most of two decades.
Rasikh and the seamers set it up
RCB won the toss and bowled, and their attack squeezed Gujarat from the first over. Rasikh Salam was the pick with 3 for 27, while Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Josh Hazlewood took two wickets apiece. Hazlewood removed Shubman Gill for 10, Patidar holding the catch, and the Gujarat captain's early exit drained the energy from a home crowd that had turned up expecting a coronation. The Titans never rebuilt the momentum and closed on 155 for 8 from their 20 overs, a total that always looked light on a good batting surface.
Kohli makes the chase look simple
Chasing 156, RCB flew out of the blocks. Kohli and Venkatesh Iyer put on 62 for the first wicket, taking 37 off Kagiso Rabada's opening two overs before Mohammed Siraj had Iyer caught for a 16-ball 32. Wickets then fell around Kohli, RCB slipping to 100 for 4 by the halfway stage, but he never lost his grip on the chase. He reached his fifty in 25 balls, the quickest he has gone to the mark in the IPL, and stayed to the finish with nine fours and three sixes at a strike rate close to 180. Jitesh Sharma was with him, unbeaten on 11, when the winning runs arrived.
Third time it has been done
Only two teams had defended an IPL title before Sunday. Chennai Super Kings managed it across 2010 and 2011, and Mumbai Indians followed in 2019 and 2020. RCB now join that company barely a year after ending their long wait for a first trophy, turning the league's most famous near-miss story into back-to-back titles. For Gujarat, a second final on home soil finished the way their Qualifier 1 meeting with RCB had, when Bengaluru won by 92 runs in Dharamsala.
For Kohli, the result caps a season in which, at 37, he has answered every question about his future with runs. He has now lifted the trophy in successive years as the senior figure in a young Bengaluru side, and the retirement talk that trailed him into the campaign feels a long way off tonight.
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