IPL 2025 Final Preview: Which team will end the Trophy Drought?

 So, finally the end of IPL 2025 is near, with the final of the tournament scheduled to be played tomorrow 3rd June, 2025 between Royal Challengers Bengaluru and Punjab Kings at Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad. Both RCB and PBKS are aiming to win their 1st IPL title and have played fantastic cricket throughout the season because of which they will play IPL 2025 Final tomorrow. How both the teams are stacked up before the big finals? Let's find out.

We will analyze the batting vs bowling of performance of both the teams against each other throughout the tournament and compare how the players perform one-on-one.

PBKS Batting vs RCB Bowling

The Big Final at Motera can be said a straight battle between RCB's bowling and PBKSs' batting and this claim is backed with stats. RCB is the best Powerplay Bowling Team in IPL 2025 with 26 wickets in 14 innings at an economy of 8.74. RCB tops the chart of wickets as well as economy in IPL 2025 and a lot of credit goes to the duo of Josh Hazlewood and Bhuvneshwar Kumar who have taken 9 and 8 wickets respectively in this phase. Josh has an economy of 7.20 in Powerplay whereas Bhuvi has an economy of 8.00 in Powerplay. These 2 bowlers are the most economical powerplay bowlers in IPL 2025. Yash Dayal takes the new ball along with Bhuvi but he hasn't been consistent in this phase as he managed to take just 4 wickets at an economy of 10.23. This pace trio will be up against the opening combination of Prabhsimran Singh and Priyansh Arya because of whom Punjab Kings have managed to score 984 runs(most in this season) in 16 innings at a run-rate of 9.65(2nd highest in this season). PBKS openers vs RCB pacers in the powerplay is going  to be a mouth-watering battle and will set the tone of the match. 

Now let's talk about middle-overs. The responsibility of scoring big runs for Punjab Kings in the middle-overs lies majorly on the shoulder's of Shreyas Iyer along with Nehal Wadhera and Josh Inglis. Inglis, Shreyas and Wadhera are No.3, 4 and 5 of the Punjab Kings batting lineup and they have been consistent in keeping up the momentum given by the openers. Shreyas Iyer is the 3rd highest run-scorer in this phase with 324 runs at a strike-rate of 166.15. The strike-rate of 166.15 is 3rd highest for a non-opener in this phase for players with more than 200 runs, just behind Nicholas Pooran and Surya Kumar Yadav. Nehal Wadhera has also been a consistent middle-order batter for Punjab Kings while batting mostly at No.4 and No.5 and has scored 290 runs at a strike-rate of 150.26. He played a great knock of 48 runs off 29 balls in Qualifier-2 against MI at Motera, the same venue where the final will be played and made a match-winning partnership with Shreyas Iyer which helped PBKS chase down a huge total of 204 runs and secure a spot in the final. Josh Inglis who started the tournament on a dull note has been impressive after his promotion at No.3 and has scored 177 runs in 5 innings at a strike-rate of 184.38 at this position. This trio will be up against the spin duo of Krunal Pandya and Suyash Sharma. Krunal has been excellent this season and has taken 10 wickets at an economy of 8.29 in the middle overs and is overall the 4th highest wicket-taker among the spinners in the tournament(across phases). Suyash Sharma has not been a premier wicket-taker which is expected from a leg-spinner but he has done incredibly well against Punjab Kings. 5 out of 8 wickets taken by Suyash this season has came against Punjab Kings and he has an economy of 6.80 against Punjab Kings as compared to his overall economy of 8.81. But the main battle of the game is Josh Hazlewood vs Shreyas Iyer. Shreyas has scored just 11 runs off 22 balls vs Josh Hazlewood in IPL history while getting dismissed 4  times. Hazlewood has dismissed Shreyas twice this season. The Iyer vs Hazlewood battle is arguably the most-important battle of the game and might be a deciding factor  in the result of the game. 

Now let's talk about death overs. This is the phase where PBKS batters have shown their actual strength and can potentially snatch the game and the trophy away from RCB tomorrow. PBKS have scored 669 runs at a run-rate of 11.34 in the death-overs this season which shows the kind of destruction PBKS have caused this season in the death-overs. The primary reason for this performance are Shashank Singh, Shreyas Iyer and Marcus Stoinis. Shashank and Shreyas are the 2nd and 3rd highest-run scorer in the death overs this season with 190 and 180 runs respectively. Shashank has a strike-rate of 179.25 whereas Shreyas has a strike-rate of 227.85. Stoinis has scored 101 runs in just 36 balls in the death-overs this season which shows the destruction he can cause and the impact his small cameo can create. This is worrisome for RCB, as RCB's death-bowling apart from Josh Hazlewood hasn't been great this season. Yes, Bhuvi and Dayal had their moments but their overall death-bowling stats are still unimpressive. Bhuvi in death-overs this season has 6 wickets at an economy of 11.12, whereas Dayal has taken 3 wickets in this phase at an economy of 12.52. In such case RCB will look to sneak in 1 over of Suyash Sharma in the death overs  who has dismissed Stoinis twice this season.

So, PBKS batting vs RCB bowling is a very close contest where RCB needs to beware of PBKSs' death-overs exploit and PBKS needs to tackle the likes of Hazlewood, Bhuvi, Krunal and Suyash.

RCB Batting vs PBKS Bowling

The opening duo of Virat Kohli and Phil Salt has been the backbone of RCB in this season. They have been consistent in giving good starts consistently in the tournament and will be hoping to do the same tomorrow. They will be up against the duo of Arshdeep Singh and Kyle Jamieson. Arshdeep has managed to dominate Salt in T20s at head-to-head level. Salt has just managed to score 38 runs against Arshdeep in 38 balls while getting dismissed 4 times which clearly shows the domination of Arshdeep. Therefore, it will be Virat Kohli's responsibility to tackle Arshdeep as he has scored 100 runs in 57 balls against Arshdeep till now in IPL while getting dismissed twice. But Kohli needs to be wary of Kyle Jamieson who dismissed him in Qualifier-1 at Mullanpur and has troubled him in test cricket during 2020-2021 period. Nonetheless, just like PBKS openers vs RCB pacers, Salt-Kohli vs Arshdeep-Jamieson is going to be a key contest in tomorrow's game and will play a crucial role in determining the fate of the game. 

Now let's talk about middle-overs. RCB's non-opening batsman have stepped up at different stages of the tournament. Devdutt Paddikal will not play this game as he is ruled out of the tournament and is replaced by Mayank Agarwal. But apart from Devdutt, players like Rajat Patidar, Jitesh Sharma, Tim David, Romario Shepherd and Liam Livingstone have scored atleast 1 50 in the tournament. Rajat, Jitehs and David have contributed in multiple wins this season and will have a crucial role to play tomorrow. Rajat who started  the tournament with 2 50s in the first 4 innings, suddenlly went out of form, he showed good rhythm in last 2 games and will be a hoping to play a good knock in the finals. Rajat has a crucial responsibility of tackling the PBKS spin-duo of Yuzvendra Chahal and Harpreet Brar. Brar has been exceptional in middle overs this season with 8 wickets at an economy of 7.47, whereas Chahal has been inconsistent but won PBKS a game vs KKR on his own and also took a hatrick vs CSK. Rajat has scored 40 runs off 27 balls vs Chahal while getting dismissed twice and both the dismissals came this season, whereas Rajat has been quite against Brar with 21 runs off 18 balls with 1 dismissal. Rajat's performance against the PBKS spin-duo in the batting-friendly Motera pitch will decide RCB's fate in the big finals. There is also a chance of Vyashak Vijayakumar getting a game tomorrow and he did well in 2 games at Motera this season so he is among the players to watch out for in this game.

Now, finally we will talk about death overs. RCB has brilliant finishers in the form of Jitesh Sharma, Tim David and Romario Shepherd. Shepherd single-handedly helped RCB in winning the game against CSK at Chinnaswamy with his 14-ball half-century. Tim David played a good knock, whenever he got a chnace to bat and Jitesh Sharma pulled of an impossible chase vs LSG and also provided a great finish vs MI. All these games show the impact RCB finishers can create. On a statistical front, Jitesh Sharma and Tim David have scored 137 and 136 runs respectively in death-overs this season at a strike-rate of 190.28 and 188.89 respectively. The responsibility to stop RCB finisher relies mainly on Arshdeep Singh who has 8 wickets at an economy of 10.04 this season in the death overs. The PBKS death-bowling  except Arshdeep Singh isn't that impressive, especially in the  absence of Marco Jansen. Yuzvendra Chahal might have to bowl an over or  2 in the death-overs tomorrow as per the match situation.

Matchups:

1. Prabhsimran Singh vs Bhuvneshwar Kumar

Prabhsimran has scored 68 runs against Bhuvi off 42 balls while getting dismissed 5 times. 2 out of the 5 dismissals have come this season.

2. Shreyas Iyer vs Josh Hazlewood

Shreyas has scored just 11 runs off 22 balls against Josh Hazlewood while getting dismissed 4 times. 2 out of 4 dismissals have come this season.

3. Phil Salt vs Arshdeep Singh

Salt has scored 38 runs off 38 balls against Arshdeep Singh while getting dismissed 4 times. 2 out of 4 dismissals came in this IPL season and the remaining came in IND vs ENG 2025 T20 series.

4. Rajat Patidar vs Yuzvendra Chahal

Rajat has scored 40 runs off 27 balls against Yuzvendra Chahal while getting dismissed twice and both the dismissals came this season.

Conclusion: PBKS have more destructive batting lineup than RCB especially in the middle and death-overs but RCB has a huge edge over PBKS when it comes to bowling. Hoping for a cracking game.