Delhi Capitals (DC) suffered a six-wicket defeat in their IPL 2026 match against Punjab Kings (PBKS) at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on Saturday (April 25).

Opting to bat first, DC racked up a mammoth 264/2 on the board. KL Rahul stole with the show with a mind-boggling 152* off 67 balls, while Nitish Rana smashed 91 off 44 balls. The duo stitched a 220-run partnership off 95 balls for the second wicket.

In reply, PBKS rode on brutal knocks from Prabhsimran Singh (76 off 26), Priyansh Arya (43 off 17), and skipper Shreyas Iyer (71* off 36) to overhaul the target with seven deliveries to spare.

After the loss, DC skipper Axar Patel pointed out that missed chances and poor fielding allowed PBKS to dominate the chase.

Notably, Iyer capitalized on two dropped catches by Karun Nair in a single Kuldeep Yadav over, remaining unbeaten to take Punjab over the line.

“Looking at the kind of wicket, if you don’t support your bowlers and keep giving away so many chances, then I feel we deserved to lose. That’s the main point. It was a good pitch and a small ground, so sixes were always going to be hit. However, when opportunities arise and you don’t take even one, you drop chances, as we did today. On a wicket like this, if you don’t back your bowlers, it becomes difficult,” Axar said at the post-match presentation.

He highlighted that the fast bowlers' performance in the powerplay was poor, allowing PBKS to start strong (116/0 in 6 overs).

“At the same time, we also need to look at our bowling unit. The way we bowled in the powerplay, the fast bowlers, the fielding, and the opportunities we missed were the main reasons. Because on a wicket like this, 264 was a very good score. If you look at the positives, we scored 264, which is a record score in the Indian Premier League. This shows that if luck goes your way a little and you take your catches, you can win two or three matches in a row,” Axar remarked.

The captain emphasized that the team needs to stop repeating the same mistakes and learn to grab crucial moments in close games.

“If you look at the matches we are losing, many were close games. That’s what I said at the toss as well, if we can grab the crucial moments, then two or three results could have gone our way and we could keep winning. But the key is that you have to seize those moments. It can’t keep happening that you come in every time and repeat the same mistakes. So I think we’ll go back, review it again, see what we can do, and where we can improve,” he concluded.