Where Royal Challengers Bengaluru finished last year
Champions. After 17 years of underperformance and heartbreak, RCB lifted their maiden IPL title, defeating Punjab Kings in a pulsating final by six runs in Ahmedabad.
What's new in IPL 2026
Cricket at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium is back. The last competitive match held at the venue was an abandoned game between RCB and Kolkata Knight Riders on May 17, 2025. Cricket came to a halt at the venue after a stampede around the stadium during RCB's title celebrations on June 4 led to the deaths of 11 people. After a lot of back and forth and work on the stadium's infrastructure, the venue has been cleared to host IPL 2026, with a government-appointed Expert committee approving it earlier this month. RCB will play five of their seven home games here, and two in Raipur.
The outlook of the RCB squad remains mostly the same as last season, with 17 players retained. Among the major buys, RCB acquired Venkatesh Iyer for INR 7 crore, but he seems unlikely to start with the top order largely settled. The other player to keep an eye out for is 23-year-old Mangesh Yadav, a left-arm quick from Madhya Pradesh, who was picked up by RCB for INR 5.2 crore.
He has the ability to bowl at 140kph and could slot in for Yash Dayal, who is out for the entire season. Jacob Duffy, who was snapped up for INR 2 crore, could also start with Josh Hazlewood likely to be unavailable for the initial part of IPL 2026.
Who's out, who's in doubt?
Hazlewood is likely to sit out the initial part of IPL 2026, with CA understood to be monitoring his workload, keeping in mind the busy cricket calendar ahead. RCB confirmed on Tuesday that Dayal, who has not been present at their pre-season training, is out for the duration of IPL 2026.
Likely best XII
1 Virat Kohli, 2 Phil Salt*, 3 Devdutt Padikkal, 4 Rajat Patidar (capt), 5 Jitesh Sharma (wk), 6 Jacob Bethell*, 7 Tim David/Romario Shepherd*, 8 Krunal Pandya, 9 Bhuvneshwar Kumar, 10 Suyash Sharma, 11 Jacob Duffy*, 12 Mangesh Yadav
*overseas player
Big question
Watch out for
How RCB start the season in Hazlewood's absence. The Australia quick was their star bowler in IPL 2025, but with uncertainty around his arrival, the fast-bowling stocks look a little thin, particularly with Dayal also unavailable. Bhuvneshwar Kumar will have to bear a lot of the responsibility along with spinners Krunal Pandya and Suyash Sharma. How RCB fare in Raipur also remains to be seen.
Keep an eye out for Mangesh Yadav. He was the leading wicket-taker at the Madhya Pradesh Premier League 2025 and soon made his Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy debut as well for MP, picking up three wickets in two games in the 2025-26 season. With Mangesh comes the unknown factor and RCB could make use of him early in the tournament.
Key stats
Chris Gayle in 2011, 2012 and 2013 and KL Rahul in 2020, 2021 and 2022 are the only two players apart from Kohli in 2023, 2024 and 2025 to record three consecutive 600-plus-runs seasons. Can Kohli do it a fourth time?
Romario Shepherd is one of only five players globally with 800-plus runs and 40-plus wickets in T20s since the last IPL.
Across the last two IPL seasons, RCB have had the second-best batting strike rate, marginally behind SRH.
RCB had the second-best economy rate of all teams last season.