Royal Challengers Bengaluru are batting first in the final of the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) against the Punjab Kings after losing the toss. They lost Phil Salt early but it was Mayank Agarwal who got the team off to a good start and helped them post 55 runs in the powerplay. Agarwal scored 24 runs off just 18 balls with two fours and a six to his name.
In the process, he completed 5000 runs in T20 cricket in 209 innings, becoming the 19th Indian cricketer to do so. He also surpassed Ruturaj Gaikwad, who has scored 4996 runs in the shortest format of the game so far, and was ruled out of the season due to injury earlier.
Interestingly, even Mayank was not featuring in the IPL as he went unsold in the mega auction and was then drafted in as a replacement for Devdutt Padikkal just before the tournament got suspended for a week due to the India-Pakistan conflict. His first game of the season was against the Sunrisers Hyderabad, and he finished the season with 95 runs in four innings in IPL 2025.
Agarwal was looking good to score big on the night of the final, but he was dismissed soon after the powerplay by Yuzvendra Chahal, with Arshdeep Singh taking a good catch. RCB will be looking to post a good total on the board as PBKS are coming off chasing a 200+ score against MI.
Playing XIs
RCB - Philip Salt, Virat Kohli, Mayank Agarawal, Rajat Patidar (c), Liam Livingstone, Jitesh Sharma (wk), Romario Shepherd, Krunal Pandya, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Yash Dayal, Josh Hazlewood
PBKS - Priyansh Arya, Josh Inglis (wk), Shreyas Iyer (c), Nehal Wadhera, Shashank Singh, Marcus Stoinis, Azmatullah Omarzai, Kyle Jamieson, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Arshdeep Singh, Yuzvendra Chahal