Rajat Patidar marshalled the Royal Challengers Bengaluru from being chasers to serial IPL winners. Since taking over the reins in 2025, Patidar has been a silent hero for the franchise, doing exceptional work both with the bat and in his captaincy. He has been the cornerstone in RCB becoming unbeatable over the last two years, and the efforts reaped rewards yet again at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.
It was the Punjab Kings last year; this time it was the Gujarat Titans. No home, no problem, says the RCB. After a stellar win against PBKS last year, RCB took down the hosts in their own backyard with one of the most one-sided IPL finals. And Patidar has been key to this title run.
Patidar achieves IPL immortality
Patidar has become just the third skipper ever to defend their Indian Premier League title, joining the list featuring only MS Dhoni and Rohit Sharma. Dhoni’s CSK did that by winning in 2010 and 2011, Rohit’s invincibles achieved the same in 2019 and 2020. RCB have now done it in 2025 and 2026 with Patidar at the helm.
While he finds himself in an elite list of these IPL and India legends, he has achieved what none of these two could have done. That is to win an IPL title as a captain in his first two seasons. Patidar was made the RCB captain in 2025 and won the title with them that year, ending an ever-long wait for their first title, and then he marshalled the team to defend the title in 2026.ย
Even Dhoni had to wait for three IPLs to win his first title after becoming the captain in 2008. Rohit had won it in his first season after taking over from Ricky Ponting midway in 2013, but won his next in 2015 only.
Patidar was only the second captain to lead a franchise in two consecutive finals in their first two seasons as captain. Only Hardik Pandya had achieved it before. But he fell agonisingly short of back-to-back titles in 2023 when his side lost a last-over thriller to the CSK. Days of glory for Patidar and RCB.
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