Bengaluru qualify for playoffs as Delhi beat Rajasthan by 5 wickets

Virat Kohli and Venkatesh Iyer struck half-centuries to help defending champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru become the first team to qualify for the IPL play-offs with a 23-run win over Punjab Kings on Sunday.

In-form Kohli struck 58 off 37 balls before Venkatesh hit an unbeaten 73 to steer the team to 222-4 after being invited to bat first in the Himalayan hill town of Dharamsala.

The bowlers, led by Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Rasikh Salam Dar, then restricted Punjab to 199-8 despite a late batting charge by Marcus Stoinis, who hit 37, and Shashank Singh, who made 56.

Bengaluru, who won their first IPL title in 18 attempts last year, consolidated top spot in the points table and secured their place in the play-offs.

Runners-up last year, Punjab, who started the season with six victories and one no-result, suffered their sixth successive defeat and are no longer in control of their fate.

The top four teams at the end of the league stage will make the playoffs in the 10-team tournament.

Kohli, who blasted an unbeaten 105 in his team’s previous win, kept up his form as he hit four fours and three sixes to lay the foundation for Bengaluru’s total after losing his opening partner Jacob Bethell for 11.

He then put on 78 with the left-handed Devdutt Padikkal, who made 45, to rebuild the innings and hit back.

Kohli raised his fourth fifty of the season and 67th in the IPL before he finally fell to leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal.

Venkatesh kept up the pace to reach his fifty as he clobbered the bowlers and put on an attacking fourth-wicket stand with Tim David, who made 28.

In reply, Punjab lost openers Priyansh Arya, for a duck, and Prabhsimran Singh, for two — both falling to Kumar’s seam bowling.

Punjab slipped further to 93-5 after skipper Shreyas Iyer (1), Cooper Connolly (37) and Suryansh Shedge (37) departed.

Impact substitute Stoinis and Shashank attempted to raise Punjab’s hopes in their partnership of 67 but disciplined bowling ensured a ninth win in 13 matches for Bengaluru. Rasikh Salam took two wickets in the final over to return figures of 3-36 while Bhuvneshwar claimed two for 38.

In another match, wicket-keeper-batter KL Rahul top-scored with a composed 56 off 42 balls as Delhi Capitals sealed a thrilling five-wicket victory over Rajasthan Royals at the Arun Jaitley Stadium.

The win has lifted DC from eighth to seventh place, as they signed off from their home fixtures on a high.

After Mitchell Starc’s 4-40 kept a marauding Rajasthan to 193/8, Rahul anchored the chase with his characteristic calmness, while sharing a key 105-run partnership with Abishek Porel, who hit 51 off 31 balls.

Ashutosh Sharma then stepped in late as the impact player to steer DC home via an unbeaten five-ball 18, as it proved to be a tense, see-saw contest that swung repeatedly before the hosts finally held their nerve and completed the chase with four balls to spare, and kept their slim playoffs hopes alive.

Chasing 194, Rahul had not even settled at the crease when fortune intervened, as Yash Raj Punja dropped him at short fine leg off Jofra Archer, apart from an overthrow giving DC four extra runs. Keeping all that aside, Rahul and Porel set about dismantling the RR bowling attack with a combination of audacity and intent, as DC reached fifty in just four overs.

Porel, the aggressor from the outset, drove and whipped Archer for a four and six, before ramping, cutting, pulling, and punching Brijesh Sharma for four boundaries. Rahul, meanwhile, was doing what he does best — rotating strike and hitting boundaries off loose balls with surgical precision. When Adam Milne dropped short in the fifth over, he rocked back and smoked a pull flat over deep mid-wicket for six.

The hundred of the opening pair — DC’s second 100-plus opening stand of IPL 2026 and both coming versus RR - arrived in the ninth over when Rahul pumped Punja straight over the sight screen for six.

Porel brought up his fifty off 30 balls before holing out to long-on off a slower ball from Brijesh in the 11th over, even as an unperturbed Rahul reached his fifty in the 12th over off 34 balls.

RR’s move to bring back Archer for his third over worked well when he drew a rash drive from Sahil Parakh, and a thick outside edge was comfortably caught by Dhruv Jurel. Dasun Shanaka dealt a huge blow to DC when Rahul attempted to punch off his slower delivery, but chopped on to his stumps without any footwork.

The pressure of the asking rate going past ten brought out sloppy misfields from RR, but it consumed Tristan Stubbs, who shaped for a pre-mediated scoop, but was caught by a sprinting deep backward square leg.

Agencies