IPL 2025 Final: Scarred by past failures, RCB and PBKS need not just good cricket but also ability to relish big occasion

2016: M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bengaluru. The scene of the IPL final. Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) versus Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH). Neither has won the title yet. And neither can really envision what might happen if they lose this game.

After 17 overs, RCB are ahead. Then, Ben Cutting shows up. And he helps SRH thunder 52 runs off the last three overs, making RCB fans gulp at what may lie ahead. In the chase, RCB start off sumptuously. Chris Gayle is doing his thing. Virat Kohli, scoring runs for breakfast, lunch and dinner in 2016, is feasting too. RCB, after ten overs, are 112-0, and have ten wickets in hand chasing 209.

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There is anticipation among the crowd. A sense of excitement. An unescapable feeling that this might finally be their time. And then…pfft! It evaporates. Gayle falls. Kohli does too. AB de Villiers and KL Rahul cannot rescue them either, nor can Shane Watson, and an evening that was theirs for the taking, does not turn into a red-letter day for the team in red.

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Two years prior to that, at that very venue, there was another team, called the Kings XI Punjab (Punjab Kings/PBKS now). Like RCB, they careened into the Chinnaswamy knowing and acknowledging their past baggage, and recognising how that occasion could be their day of days.

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They batted first and got to 199. Not a world-beating score, but a very healthy total in a final. With seven overs of the chase left, they were decently-placed to end their hoodoo. But Punjab could not make it count. The contest, rather than gravitating towards them, kept drifting away, and KKR got over the line.

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Punjab, since that evening of coming close to their crescendo but not being able to clasp it, have struggled in the competition. Now, it promises to change. Now, there is light at the end of the tunnel. And for a change, it no longer feels like an onrushing train.

‘Irresistible’ PBKS face ‘immovable’ RCB

Which brings us to the current landscape, and there is no denying that RCB and PBKS have been the two standout teams this season: extremely efficient, dripping with match-winning quality, and almost interchangeable for one another.

Punjab, though, because of their batting prowess, have painted themselves as the irresistible force. They have made 200 or more in half of their games this campaign, and those batting muscles were flexed against the Mumbai Indians in the Qualifier.

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RCB, meanwhile, have been the immovable object, built on a magnificent bowling attack, led by Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Josh Hazlewood, and supported superbly by Krunal Pandya, Suyash Sharma and Yash Dayal. And they have the recent precedent of stopping the irresistible force too, having rolled PBKS over for a paltry total days ago .

This, thus, could be the broader contest that decides the outcome. But there are other smaller, more intricate sub-plots too, which add a further layer of intrigue.

Arshdeep Singh vs RCB openers

For example, Arshdeep Singh, barring Qualifier 1, has had Phil Salt on barbecue throughout this calendar year. Kohli, too, has a tendency to fall to left-arm pacers in important white-ball matches, and he has been dismissed by Kyle Jamieson on more than one occasion.

There is also a school of thought that RCB may struggle if both of their openers are dismissed cheaply – something PBKS managed in Bengaluru earlier this season, and RCB will have to guard against. Despite the fact that Jitesh Sharma, Romario Shepherd and their middle order, in general, are in scintillating form.

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On the other side, Shreyas Iyer has an ordinary record against RCB’s premier pacers, with Hazlewood, in particular, an enormous threat to him. Their overseas batters have not clicked consistently enough as well, and their bowling unit, in recent times, has also developed a tendency to leak runs.

Iyer poses threat, but RCB look more ready

PBKS’ batting against high-quality pace can also be a little circumspect. But they have some exceptional spin-hitters, including skipper Shreyas. And if they can navigate RCB’s pace-bowling threat, they might be able to cash in on a ground where they have breached 200 twice in two attempts this season.

There is also the paradigm of neither of these teams really relishing the big occasion, as their trophy cabinet (so far) suggests. One of them, however, will have to get that monkey off their back. RCB seem better-equipped, having inflicted misery on PBKS last Thursday, but PBKS have played in Ahmedabad more recently.

And so, it is rather fitting that these two sides will have to look each other in the eye on Tuesday, and dare their opponent to take their moment away from them. All while the pair, perhaps a little nervous, possibly a little restless, probably a little anxious, try desperately not to flinch.

Maybe it was written in the stars all along. That these two franchises, who have been no strangers to world-class cricketers, but have also been rather frequent visitors to the well of disappointment and dejection, will have to go through one another, if they are to wind up where they want to be, and where they have always dreamt of being.

Their paths can no longer exist in different planes, prisms, or spectrums. They are, as corporate jargon would put it, mutually exclusive now. If RCB win, Punjab won’t. And if Punjab win, RCB will not have. That may be stating the obvious, but the weight of those statements, with disjunction the overriding theme rather than conjunction, cannot be understated.

Back in 2014 and back in 2016, Punjab and RCB (respectively) had their tryst with fate, discernibly distant from one another, even if it occurred at the same place. Both, as their rival fans are quick to point out, fluffed their lines.

And in 2025, here they are. Toe-to-toe, shoulder-to-shoulder and eyeball-to-eyeball. Mindful of their previous mistakes, mishaps and missteps, but acutely aware of the mystically marvelous power of silverware and how it alters narratives, and transforms past nightmares into mere memories.

One of them, on Tuesday, will experience that and enter the domain of champions, and irrespective of whatever happens in years to come, will have that tale to tell for generations. And the other, well, they will still not have won the final game of the season. Despite coming agonisingly and tantalisingly close. Much like all those years ago.