RCB under Rajat Patidar defeated Shubman Gill's GT by five wickets in Ahmedabad in the IPL 2026 to retain the title they won back in 2025. Chasing a target of 156, RCB won with 12 balls to spare.

Virat Kohli top-scored for RCB with an unbeaten 75. RCB became only the 3rd franchise to win back-to-back IPL titles after CSK and MI.

Rajat Patidar Joins Special Club

Earlier, GT made 155/8. RCB's Rasikh Salam Dar was the pick of the bowlers with 3/27. Patidar joins MS Dhoni and Rohit Sharma in a very special club. Dhoni led CSK to consecutive titles in 2010 and 2011, while Rohit did it for MI in 2019 and 2020. After no titles in the first 17 seasons, RCB now have two in two years.

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For GT, it was a 2nd loss in the final in three appearances across five seasons. Under Hardik Pandya, they won the title in their maiden season in 2022. In 2023, Hardik led GT to the final where they lost narrowly to CSK. This was GT's 3rd final and 1st under Gill. But they ended up 2nd best as Patidar's side proved to be the better team on the given day.

The Qualifier 1 Trend Continues

The trend of the Qualifier 1 winner clinching the IPL title continued since the streak began in 2018 and now it's nine on the trot. Overall, 13 out of 16 Qualifier 1 winners have been crowned IPL champions.

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RCB Faced GT in Qualifier 1 and won by 92 runs. GT had a second chance vs RR in Qualifier 2 and crushed them by seven wickets to set up a title clash with the defending champions. Unfortunately, they did not get their revenge. In the league stage, RCB and GT along with SRH finished with the same number of points but RCB came 1st based on NRR while GT took 2nd place and SRH finished 3rd. RR came 4th.