The IPL Story
Every season, told as it happened — plus the through-lines that connect them: the dynasties, the rivalries, the controversies, and the players who bent the league to their will. Each piece is dated to its moment and grounded in ball-by-ball data computed by the CricketLogic engine.
Kings again: RCB go back-to-back in 2026
Twelve months after ending an eighteen-year wait, Royal Challengers Bengaluru did the harder thing — they defended the crown, beating Gujarat Titans by 5 wickets in Ahmedabad as Virat Kohli's unbeaten 75 made them only the third team to go back-to-back.
Eighteen years: the RCB heartbreak file — and how it ended
Three lost finals, one record-shattering batting era and no trophy — this is the anatomy of Royal Challengers Bengaluru's eighteen-year heartbreak, and why 2025 finally set it right.
Ee sala cup namde: RCB finally end the 18-year wait
After eighteen seasons, three lost finals and a fan base that turned 'Ee sala cup namde' into a prayer, Royal Challengers Bengaluru are IPL champions — 6 runs the margin over Punjab Kings that separated agony from ecstasy.
The Dhoni dynasty: how CSK became the IPL's constant
Chennai Super Kings just won their fifth IPL crown, and the story is always the same one — MS Dhoni's stillness, a core that never leaves, and a franchise that survived even a two-year ban to keep winning.
The summer cricket lost its innocence: the 2013 IPL betting case, explained
On 14 July 2015, the Supreme Court-appointed Lodha Committee suspended Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals from the IPL for two years and banned team officials Gurunath Meiyappan and Raj Kundra from cricket for life — the closing chapter of the corruption case that broke over the 2013 season.
Season by season
Nineteen finals, nineteen dispatches — 2008 to 2026.
Kings again: RCB go back-to-back in 2026
Twelve months after ending an eighteen-year wait, Royal Challengers Bengaluru did the harder thing — they defended the crown, beating Gujarat Titans by 5 wickets in Ahmedabad as Virat Kohli's unbeaten 75 made them only the third team to go back-to-back.
Ee sala cup namde: RCB finally end the 18-year wait
After eighteen seasons, three lost finals and a fan base that turned 'Ee sala cup namde' into a prayer, Royal Challengers Bengaluru are IPL champions — 6 runs the margin over Punjab Kings that separated agony from ecstasy.
The year of 250: KKR win a third title in the season scoring broke
Kolkata Knight Riders are champions for a third time, dismantling Sunrisers Hyderabad by 8 wickets in Chennai to end the highest-scoring season the IPL had ever seen with its most one-sided final.
Ten off two, past midnight: Dhoni's fifth arrives on the reserve day
Needing ten off the last two balls of a final that had already survived a washout and a reserve day, Ravindra Jadeja struck six then four to beat Gujarat Titans by 5 wickets and hand MS Dhoni a fifth IPL crown, level with Mumbai Indians.
Newborn champions: Gujarat Titans win the IPL at the first attempt
Gujarat Titans, playing their very first IPL season, beat Rajasthan Royals by 7 wickets in the final at Ahmedabad — captain Hardik Pandya taking 3 for 17 and top-scoring to make a champion of a team that did not exist a year earlier.
Exiles no more: CSK win a fourth title in the Dubai night
Twelve months after their worst-ever campaign, Chennai Super Kings are champions again — Faf du Plessis's 86 the spine of a 192, and a 27-run win over Kolkata Knight Riders in Dubai that seals a fourth crown.
The bubble season: Mumbai crown a pandemic-year IPL in the UAE desert
In an empty Dubai stadium at the end of a season played entirely inside a UAE bio-bubble, Mumbai Indians dismantled a first-time finalist Delhi Capitals by 5 wickets to lift a record fifth IPL crown.
One run, again: Mumbai Indians edge CSK for a record fourth title
For the second time in three years Mumbai Indians won an IPL final by exactly one run, Lasith Malinga's last-ball yorker trapping Shardul Thakur to deny Chennai Super Kings and hand MI a record fourth crown.
Return from exile: CSK's 'dad's army' wins it at the first attempt
Two years in exile, a squad written off as a 'dad's army', a home ripped away by protests — and still Chennai Super Kings came back and won it, beating Sunrisers Hyderabad by 8 wickets as Shane Watson hammered an unbeaten 117.
One run: Mumbai defend 129 to win the closest final the IPL had ever seen
Mumbai Indians beat Rising Pune Supergiant by 1 run in the Hyderabad final — defending the lowest total in IPL final history to claim a third crown, with Krunal Pandya named Player of the Match.
973 and no trophy: Kohli's masterpiece, Warner's crown
Sunrisers Hyderabad are champions — an 8-run win over Royal Challengers Bangalore in Bengaluru delivering David Warner his crown and leaving Virat Kohli, author of the greatest batting season the IPL has ever seen, with 973 runs and nothing to show for them.
Mumbai Indians go from bottom of the table to second title
Rohit Sharma's 26-ball fifty and a Lendl Simmons blitz powered Mumbai Indians to 202, and Chennai Super Kings never got close — a 41-run win at Eden Gardens that sealed MI's second IPL crown from what had looked like a lost season.
Nine in a row: KKR ride the surge to a second title
Kolkata Knight Riders won their second IPL title in 2014, running down a record 200 in the final to beat Kings XI Punjab by 3 wickets in Bangalore — the last act of a season-defining nine-match winning streak, lit up by a 94 from Manish Pandey.
Rohit's first crown: Mumbai Indians finally get their hands on the cup
Mumbai Indians are champions at last — 23 runs the margin over Chennai Super Kings at Eden Gardens, a maiden title for the franchise and for Rohit Sharma the captain, closing a season the game would rather forget for reasons far from the field.
IPL 2012: Gambhir's Knight Riders raid Chepauk for a maiden crown
Kolkata Knight Riders are IPL champions for the first time, beating two-time holders Chennai Super Kings by five wickets in their own fortress at Chepauk — an unheralded Manvinder Bisla launching the raid with 89 off 48 balls.
Chennai go back-to-back: CSK maul RCB to defend their crown
Chennai Super Kings became the first side to win back-to-back IPL titles, thrashing Royal Challengers Bangalore by 58 runs in the final at the M. A. Chidambaram Stadium — Murali Vijay's 95 the hammer that broke the chase before it began.
Whistle Podu: CSK convert two years of hurt into a first crown
MS Dhoni finally has his IPL crown — Chennai Super Kings beat league-toppers Mumbai Indians by 22 runs at the DY Patil Stadium, with a cool Suresh Raina 57 not out the difference in the first CSK–MI final.
Wooden spoon to crown: Deccan Chargers rule a season in exile
One year after finishing dead last, Adam Gilchrist's Deccan Chargers won the 2009 IPL — a tournament played entirely in South Africa — beating Royal Challengers Bangalore by 6 runs at the Wanderers despite Anil Kumble's 4 for 16.
The cheapest team in the room: Rajasthan Royals win the first IPL
On the final ball at the DY Patil Stadium, Shane Warne's Rajasthan Royals — the cheapest squad in the auction — scrambled the run that beat Chennai Super Kings by 3 wickets and made the IPL's inaugural champions its unlikeliest.
Features & long reads
The narratives that run across seasons.
Vaibhav Suryavanshi and the teenage takeover
A fifteen-year-old opener from Bihar just won the Orange Cap — Vaibhav Suryavanshi finished IPL 2026 with 776 runs at a strike rate above 237 for Rajasthan Royals, rewriting the league's record book before he could legally drive to the ground.
Eighteen years: the RCB heartbreak file — and how it ended
Three lost finals, one record-shattering batting era and no trophy — this is the anatomy of Royal Challengers Bengaluru's eighteen-year heartbreak, and why 2025 finally set it right.
Still waiting: the IPL teams that have never won
Punjab Kings and Delhi Capitals have been in the IPL since ball one and never once held the cup — a wait defined by one blown final each and a lot of almost.
The greatest nights: iconic IPL innings and finishes
The IPL's legend was built on a handful of unforgettable individual explosions — McCullum's 158* on opening night, Gayle's 175*, de Villiers' 360-degree chases and a run of last-ball Super Overs — and here they are, in one place.
The 200 era: how IPL totals exploded
In 2008 a score of 200 was a rare, match-winning event; by 2024 it had become almost routine, and the Impact Player rule plus fearless batting pushed the record all the way to Sunrisers Hyderabad's 287.
The captaincy tree: the leaders who shaped the IPL
Two captains — MS Dhoni and Rohit Sharma — own five IPL titles apiece, and the rest of the tournament's identity was drawn by the leaders around them.
Made in the IPL: the uncapped Indians who became India
The IPL's most valuable export was never the entertainment — it was the players: a talent-hunting machine that found Jasprit Bumrah in a Syed Mushtaq Ali match and handed the India dressing room a decade of ready-made internationals.
Ice in the veins: the great IPL finishers
The IPL's most valuable job is not scoring the most runs — it's finishing, the craft Dhoni defined and Kieron Pollard, Andre Russell and Rinku Singh have each pushed to a new extreme.
Fortresses: the grounds that shaped the IPL
The IPL's greatest venues each impose a personality on the game — Chepauk turns, the Chinnaswamy explodes, Eden roars — and home advantage in this league is really about learning to weaponise a pitch.
The Impact Player era: how one rule rewired T20
In 2023 the IPL let every side swap in a specialist mid-match, and the twelfth-man revolution instantly doubled the number of 200-plus scores — while sparking a fight over whether the all-rounder had just been made obsolete.
The Dhoni dynasty: how CSK became the IPL's constant
Chennai Super Kings just won their fifth IPL crown, and the story is always the same one — MS Dhoni's stillness, a core that never leaves, and a franchise that survived even a two-year ban to keep winning.
El Clásico of the IPL: CSK vs Mumbai Indians
No two teams define the IPL like Chennai and Mumbai — ten titles between them, four finals contested, and a Dhoni-versus-Rohit subplot that has decided the biggest nights the league has staged.
Turning the game: the spin kings of the IPL
The IPL was designed for six-hitting, yet its defining bowlers are spinners — because on flat decks in the middle overs, mystery and wrist spin are the only weapons that both dry up runs and take wickets.
The last four overs: the art of death bowling
The IPL's great dynasties were built at the death: the bowlers who could nail a yorker or float a slower ball at the last, when a single run decides a trophy.
The auction is the season: the IPL's economy of stars
The IPL's title race is won and lost in a Bengaluru ballroom in February: retention caps, record bids and the on-again-off-again Right to Match card shape every squad long before the toss.
Cricket in exile: the IPL's seasons away from home
When elections and then a pandemic made India impossible, the IPL simply packed up and left — staging entire seasons in South Africa and the UAE rather than stop.
Sudden death: the IPL's greatest Super Overs
A Super Over is the IPL's sudden-death penalty shootout — six balls, no margin — and the handful of ties that reached it have delivered some of the tournament's most unbearable, unforgettable cricket.
The overseas legends: the imports who defined the IPL
The IPL's foreign imports — Gayle, de Villiers, Warner, Russell, Narine and Rashid Khan chief among them — did more than fill overseas slots; they set the league's records, defined its eras and taught it new ways to play.
The Mumbai Machine: five titles, one blueprint
Mumbai Indians beat Delhi Capitals by five wickets in Dubai to win a record fifth IPL title — the flourish on a decade-long dynasty built not on marquee names but on calm captaincy, ruthless death bowling and players the franchise found and raised itself.
The summer cricket lost its innocence: the 2013 IPL betting case, explained
On 14 July 2015, the Supreme Court-appointed Lodha Committee suspended Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals from the IPL for two years and banned team officials Gurunath Meiyappan and Raj Kundra from cricket for life — the closing chapter of the corruption case that broke over the 2013 season.