Punjab Kings (PBKS) suffered their second defeat in IPL 2026 after they lost to the Gujarat Titans (GT_ at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Hyderabad. PBKS have been ruthless this season, but the team suffered a rare failure on Sunday, May 3, as the batting collapsed and could only set a target of 164 for GT to win. PBKS did make life tough for GT, who had to work hard for the win, but Sai Sudharsan’s 57 and 40 not out by Washington Sundar took them home.
PBKS were in a dire state after being put into bat first and were reeling at 47-5 before Suryansh Shedge’s 57 and Marcus Stoinis’ 40 lifted them to a fighting total of 163-9. For GT, Jason Holder was the wrecker-in-chief and picked four wickets for 24 runs.
Reacting to the defeat, Shreyas Iyer said that the total set by PBKS was strong, given the surface and the early damage done by the Titans’ bowlers.
“Yes, absolutely. I personally feel that it was a great score, especially on a wicket where the ball was doing a bit at the start, with the new ball,” Iyer said.
Iyer said Gujarat’s bowlers put PBKS on the back foot early after making full use of the conditions. “I personally feel that their bowlers made the best use of the surface, the way they were hitting the lengths and the deck. It was right in the stumps and not giving us many options to open our arms and score runs at the start,” he said.
“We lost four wickets, I assume, in the powerplay. Just to get to 160 from there, it was a phenomenal effort,” he said.
‘Kudos To The Effort’: Shreyas Iyer Lauds PBKS For Fightback
Iyer said given the surface, he expected to get early wickets and put GT under pressure, but things didn’t go as planned. He, however, praised the team for running GT close and maintaining a positive attitude on the field.
“With the new ball, I thought that we would be able to hit our line and lengths pretty accurately and get early wickets so that we could put some pressure on them,” he said. “But that didn’t work out. But the way we fought in the end, I think kudos to the efforts and the attitude and approach was excellent,” he added.
Iyer was asked if the bowlers failed to execute the plans as there were plenty of runs scored square of the wicket to which he said that scoring square was difficult on the surface thus they build the styrategy around bowling hard lengths, but he admitted that the execution was not perfect from the bowlers.
“We were short on hitting the hard lengths. I feel if you see hitting over mid-wicket or pull shot wasn’t easy on this wicket because there was variable bounce and just to hit on the rise wasn’t an apt wicket to bat on,” Iyer said.
“In terms of execution, we fell a bit short. But that’s not the reason. We are still on the top of the table. That’s what matters, and we’ll be taking a lot of positives from this game,” he added.
Iyer further said that pitches such as these can lift the confidence of bowlers in a tournament like IPL, where scores of 220 have been just about par.
“It’s a great challenge, especially going forward in the IPL because it also tends to bring up the attitude of the bowlers as well. It can level up their confidence,” he said.
