Follow UsThe teams that finished top two in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025, Punjab Kings (PBKS) and Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) clash in Qualifier 1 in Mullanpur on May 29 (Thursday).
The winner of this match gets a direct entry into the final, while it is not all over for the losing side, as they will take on the winner of the Eliminator. However, no one will want to leave it that late and book their place in the finale by winning this game. Which team will do that?
PBKS Probable Playing 11
Priyansh Arya, Josh Inglis (wk), Shreyas Iyer (c), Nehal Wadhera, Shashank Singh, Marcus Stoinis, Azmatullah Omarzai, Harpreet Brar, Kyle Jamieson, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Arshdeep Singh; Yuzvendra Chahal (IP)
RCB Probable Playing 11
Philip Salt, Virat Kohli, Mayank Agarawal, Liam Livingstone, Jitesh Sharma (c & wk), Romario Shepherd, Krunal Pandya, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Yash Dayal, Josh Hazlewood, Suyash Sharma; Rajat Patidat (IP)
*There’s injury concern over Tim David, and if he is fit, he will slot in for Liam Livingstone.
PBKS squad for IPL 2025
Priyansh Arya, Josh Inglis (wk), Shreyas Iyer (c), Nehal Wadhera, Shashank Singh, Marcus Stoinis, Marco Jansen, Harpreet Brar, Kyle Jamieson, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Arshdeep Singh, Prabhsimran Singh, Suryansh Shedge, Musheer Khan, Xavier Bartlett, Praveen Dubey, Yuzvendra Chahal, Vishnu Vinod, Yash Thakur, Azmatullah Omarzai, Aaron Hardie, Kuldeep Sen, Mitchell Owen, Harnoor Singh, Pyla Avinash
RCB squad for IPL 2025
Philip Salt, Virat Kohli, Mayank Agarawal, Liam Livingstone, Jitesh Sharma (c & wk), Romario Shepherd, Krunal Pandya, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Yash Dayal, Nuwan Thushara, Suyash Sharma, Rajat Patidar, Rasikh Dar Salam, Manoj Bhandage, Tim Seifert, Swapnil Singh, Tim David, Mohit Rathee, Swastik Chikara, Abhinandan Singh, Josh Hazlewood, Blessing Muzarabani
You can catch live-streaming of PBKS vs RCB and every other IPL 2025 game on Star Sports Network (TV) and JioHotstar (Digital) in India.
The PBKS vs RCB match will kick off on May 29 at 7:30 PM IST.
You can buy the tickets for the PBKS vs RCB match on District by Zomato app or website. Click here for the tickets.
Safe picks: Shreyas Iyer (PBKS), Yuzvendra Chahal (PBKS), Virat Kohli (RCB), Phil Salt (RCB)
Risky picks: Marcus Stoinis (PBKS), Nehal Wadhera (PBKS), Suyash Sharma (RCB), Jitesh Sharma (RCB)
PBKS have a slight edge having won 18 of the 35 matches against RCB. However, RCB have won four of their last five matches against PBKS. You can check all head-to-head records for this game as well as other IPL matches in our in-house tool here.
Both teams are pretty evenly matched, and it promises to be a cracking contest with a place in the final on the line. But given RCB's performances outside the Chinnaswamy Stadium, they could have the slight edge. Plus, they also won the league match in Mullanpur against PBKS earlier this season.
With 602 runs at a strike rate of 147.91 along with eight fifties in 13 innings, look no further than Virat Kohli to do most of the damage in this match.
Both Josh Hazlewood and Arshdeep Singh have picked up the same number of wickets (18) in IPL 2025. However, the RCB pacer has played fewer matches and has a better economy rate, strike rate and average, making him deadly.
The pacers have picked up 54% of the wickets, but it is the spinners who have shown a lot more control as they have kept the runs down (ER 7.6) and have struck more regularly with an average of 18.7 and strike rate of 14.8, which are significantly better than the fast bowlers.
There's no chance of rain in Mullanpur on Thursday, and we should get a full game in. The temperatures at the start of the match will be around 36°C and should go down as the match progresses, with cool wind blowing throughout.