Royal Challengers Bengaluru vs Mumbai Indians
10 May 2026
Tim David was fined 30% of his match fee and handed two demerit points after appearing to raise his middle finger towards the Mumbai Indians dugout as RCB's two-wicket win sealed MI's exit from IPL 2026 — a gesture broadcast cameras caught live and social media amplified within minutes.
Sunrisers Hyderabad vs Chennai Super Kings
18 May 2026
Ishan Kishan mimicked blowing a whistle at the Chepauk crowd and gestured for fans to leave after SRH's five-wicket win over CSK — a celebration that divided the cricket world, with R. Ashwin criticising him and Sunil Gavaskar defending him.
Punjab Kings
26 May 2026
Arshdeep Singh deleted more than 200 Instagram posts within 24 hours following Punjab Kings' playoff exit and a season defined by accumulating controversies — wiping his feed of team content, personal posts, and a viral reel with Virat Kohli, leaving behind only brand endorsements.
Gujarat Titans vs Rajasthan Royals
29 May 2026
The Qualifier 2 toss between Gujarat Titans and Rajasthan Royals at Mullanpur had to be conducted twice after match referee Prakash Bhatt failed to hear Riyan Parag's call — a visible frustration for Shubman Gill who appeared to have won the original toss before the do-over.
Bangladesh vs ICC
7 February 2026
Bangladesh refused to play T20 World Cup 2026 in India and were replaced by Scotland after the ICC rejected their security-concern relocation demand.
South Africa, West Indies, England
10 March 2026
South Africa and West Indies stranded in India 8-11 days after T20 WC 2026 while England departed in 48 hours, sparking ICC bias claims.
Lucknow Super Giants vs Kolkata Knight Riders
26 April 2026
Kartik Tyagi bowled two beamers in the final over of LSG's chase but was allowed to continue — umpires called only one dangerous — sparking IPL fury.
Mumbai Indians vs Royal Challengers Bengaluru
14 April 2026
Tim David fined 25% of match fee for twice refusing to hand the ball to umpires in the same match — a Level 1 Code of Conduct breach.
Kolkata Knight Riders vs Mumbai Indians
20 May 2026
Hardik Pandya fined 10% of match fee for knocking bails off in frustration during MI vs KKR — a Level 1 equipment abuse offence in IPL 2026.
Cricket Canada
12 May 2026
ICC suspended six months of funding to Cricket Canada over governance failures and financial misreporting — 63% of their total revenue.
Rajasthan Royals
10 May 2026
Riyan Parag attacked IPL commentators for personal remarks after his vaping fine, telling broadcasters to talk about cricket only in a press conference.
Punjab Kings
7 May 2026
Yuzvendra Chahal was allegedly captured vaping aboard a Punjab Kings team charter flight en route to Hyderabad ahead of the franchise's IPL 2026 match against Sunrisers Hyderabad on 6 May 2026. The footage surfaced from a behind-the-scenes vlog uploaded to social media by Chahal's PBKS teammate Arshdeep Singh, in which a figure appearing to be Chahal is visible with what observers identified as an electronic cigarette. The clip went viral within hours. Neither Chahal nor Arshdeep issued a public statement; Punjab Kings and the BCCI both remained silent. The controversy arrived just days after the BCCI had formally penalised Rajasthan Royals batter Riyan Parag for vaping in the team dressing room — and before the board had yet issued its blanket vaping ban for IPL venues.
Multiple franchises
8 May 2026
The IPL's Anti-Corruption and Security Unit (ACSU) submitted a formal report to the BCCI in May 2026 flagging "certain anomalies" observed across the league stage: unauthorised persons had been seen in the team dugout, on the team bus, and at team hotels during IPL matches in apparent breach of anti-corruption Standard Operating Procedures. IPL chairman Arun Dhumal confirmed the report publicly and warned that "very stringent action" would be taken if violations continued. Separately, the BCCI tightened protocols after reports that certain franchise owners had been seen mingling with players in restricted areas — a specific interaction prohibited under the anti-corruption framework.
Punjab Kings vs Mumbai Indians
15 May 2026
Punjab Kings fast bowler Arshdeep Singh sparked a national controversy when a video from a pre-match interaction before PBKS's IPL 2026 encounter with Mumbai Indians went viral on 15 May 2026. In the clip, Arshdeep greeted Mumbai Indians batter Tilak Varma by calling him "Andhere" — Hindi slang meaning "dark one" or "darkness" — before asking whether he had applied sunscreen and then holding him next to teammate Naman Dhir, saying "This is the real glow of Punjab." The remarks, directed at Tilak's dark skin tone, were condemned by former India spinner Laxman Sivaramakrishnan as a racial slur and generated widespread public debate about the normalisation of colourism in Indian cricket. Mumbai Indians' social media response — a viral post showing Tilak emerging from darkness — was itself criticised for amplifying rather than defusing the controversy.
Mumbai Indians vs Punjab Kings
15 May 2026
Mumbai Indians batting coach Kieron Pollard was fined 15 per cent of his applicable match fee and given one demerit point after directing audible abusive language at the fourth umpire during MI's tense last-ball IPL 2026 victory over Punjab Kings at the Wankhede Stadium on 15 May 2026. The offence — a Level 1 breach of Article 2.3 of the IPL Code of Conduct — occurred during the 19th over of the second innings. Pollard admitted the offence and accepted the sanction imposed by match referee Pankaj Dharmani.
Sunrisers Hyderabad vs Royal Challengers Bengaluru
23 May 2026
Virat Kohli walked past an outstretched hand from Travis Head without acknowledgement at the post-match handshake ceremony following Sunrisers Hyderabad's 55-run defeat of Royal Challengers Bengaluru at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad on 23 May 2026. The snub came after a heated on-field exchange in RCB's chase of a massive 256-run target, during which Kohli, set up by Venkatesh Iyer's blazing start, taunted Head by miming the Impact Player signal and appearing to invite him to come and bowl. Kohli was dismissed for 15 off 11 balls — to a bowler other than Head — and Head's parting line, audible to multiple broadcasters, was: "Mate, you got out before I even came on to bowl." After the match, Kohli shook hands with SRH captain Pat Cummins and Abhishek Sharma but visibly bypassed Head, who was standing in the handshake line with his arm extended. Head's subsequent Instagram story — "Keep the body guessing" — went viral.
BCCI / IPL franchises
9 May 2026
IPL 2026 matches were suspended and rescheduled in early May 2026 as India-Pakistan geopolitical tensions escalated, marking the first mid-tournament disruption to the IPL since the 2009 security-led move to South Africa. The BCCI briefly paused operations before resuming the competition.
Kolkata Knight Riders vs opponents
26 April 2026
Kolkata Knight Riders opener Angkrish Raghuvanshi was given out "obstructing the field" on 26 April 2026 — the highest-profile use of one of cricket's rarest dismissals in IPL history. Third umpire Rohan Pandit ruled that Raghuvanshi had changed his line while watching the throw, denying the fielding side a clean run-out attempt. The decision turned on the question of intent, and split the cricket world.
Gujarat Titans vs Royal Challengers Bengaluru
30 April 2026
Rajat Patidar was given out caught by Jason Holder in the deep during RCB's match against Gujarat Titans on 30 April 2026, in a third-umpire decision that triggered one of the season's most heated on-field arguments. Replays showed Holder still moving and sliding as he completed the take, and Aakash Chopra publicly described the umpire as "the villain" of the call. Virat Kohli, fielding when the next innings began, walked across to argue with the umpires — a clip that was the most-shared cricket video in India for 24 hours.
Mumbai Indians vs Chennai Super Kings
3 May 2026
A 10th-over flashpoint between Tilak Varma and Jamie Overton during MI's innings against CSK at Wankhede produced one of the most replayed clips of IPL 2026 — and a backstory CSK captain Ruturaj Gaikwad later admitted he had personally lit. After Tilak struck Overton for a four, Gaikwad told Overton from the boundary that the all-rounder ought to "go home and skip the IPL". Overton, infuriated, took it onto the field; the next over, Tilak nudged the ball towards midwicket, looked for a second run, and had to swerve past Overton at the non-striker's end. Words flew. Suryakumar Yadav and the umpires intervened.
Canada vs New Zealand
10 April 2026
The International Cricket Council's Anti-Corruption Unit opened a formal investigation into Canada's 2026 T20 World Cup group-stage fixture against New Zealand after a 10 April CBC documentary, "Corruption, Crime and Cricket", aired allegations of match-fixing and broader governance failure inside Cricket Canada. The probe centres on the fifth over of New Zealand's chase, bowled by Canada captain Dilpreet Bajwa — who had been appointed only three weeks before the tournament — and on a recorded telephonic conversation involving former Canadian coach Khurram Chohan.
Chennai Super Kings vs Gujarat Titans
25 April 2026
In the 18th over of CSK's innings against Gujarat Titans, Kartik Sharma top-edged a pull off Kagiso Rabada that hung in the Chennai air for what felt like an eternity. Rashid Khan, sprinting from deep midwicket, and Manav Suthar, sprinting from deep square leg, both arrived at the same point at the same instant. Neither called. Neither took the catch. The ball landed between them as they collided gently and the broadcast feed cut to two grown international cricketers laughing at themselves on the outfield.
Mumbai Indians
29 April 2026
A pre-match practice session at the Wankhede produced one of IPL 2026's most circulated bystander clips. Quinton de Kock, in middle practice ahead of a Mumbai Indians home game, hit a towering straight six that cleared the practice area and headed for the back wall. A ball boy, repositioning behind the boundary, attempted a leaping catch and instead caught his shoulder against a TV set on a stand, sending the monitor toppling onto the grass. The ball, untouched, rolled away. The TV survived. The clip did not.
Punjab Kings
1 May 2026
A 38-second clip of Punjab Kings' Arshdeep Singh roasting teammate Shashank Singh in an airport lounge became one of IPL 2026's most-shared off-field moments. The premise was Shashank's run of dropped catches across the season — including the now-notorious drop of KL Rahul on 12, who went on to make 150-plus. Arshdeep, on camera, asks Shashank to demonstrate his catching technique using a coffee cup; the bit lands, both players laugh, and the clip is uploaded by a teammate before the squad has cleared security.
Rajasthan Royals
5 May 2026
A year after becoming the youngest centurion in IPL history at 14, Vaibhav Suryavanshi spent the IPL 2026 league phase doing something even harder: leading the tournament's batting impact charts as a 15-year-old. By the end of the league stage, Suryavanshi sat on 499.91 batting impact points and 404 actual runs — the highest impact score of the season, ahead of established internationals — and Rajasthan Royals had built a top-four campaign almost entirely around him.
PSL franchises
22 March 2026
Pakistan Super League 2026 became the first major franchise tournament in modern cricket history to be played behind closed doors for reasons unrelated to a pandemic. Citing the economic and logistical impact of the 2026 Iran war, the Government of Pakistan and the PCB announced on 22 March that the season would be confined to Lahore and Karachi and played to empty stadiums to reduce inter-city movement and conserve fuel. The opening ceremony was cancelled. A pink-ball broadcast experiment, fake-crowd-noise audio leaks, and broadcast-quality complaints turned the season into a string of small public-relations crises.
All international and ICC-sanctioned cricket
1 May 2026
Effective from 1 May 2026, the ICC and MCC announced their biggest single window of cricket rule changes in more than a decade — five tweaks to ICC playing conditions and 73 separate revisions to the MCC Laws of Cricket. The changes touch ODI ball use, boundary-catch mechanics, deliberate short-running penalties, the stop-clock regime, concussion-and-injury replacements, and a long list of smaller multi-day-cricket clarifications. The combined effect is a cricket rulebook that looks materially different to the one that opened the year.
Rajasthan Royals
April 2026
Vaibhav Suryavanshi smashed a 36-ball century in IPL 2026 — the fastest of the season and the third-fastest in IPL history. Batting first at his home ground in Jaipur, the 15-year-old followed up his record-breaking 14-year-old century from 2025 with a sequel that confirmed his place at the very top of T20 cricket's young-player conversation.
Mumbai Indians vs Sunrisers Hyderabad
29 April 2026
Ryan Rickelton smashed the fastest century by a Mumbai Indians batter in IPL history — 100 off 44 balls — in MI's clash against Sunrisers Hyderabad on 29 April 2026. Rickelton finished unbeaten on 123 off 55 deliveries, the highest individual score by an MI batter in IPL history.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru vs Gujarat Titans
24 April 2026
Sai Sudharsan, opening for Gujarat Titans against Royal Challengers Bengaluru on 24 April 2026, scored a 57-ball century that took him past Chris Gayle's longstanding mark to become the fastest player by innings count to reach 2,000 IPL runs. Sudharsan reached the milestone in 47 innings; Gayle had taken 48.
Lucknow Super Giants vs Kolkata Knight Riders
26 April 2026
Rinku Singh's 83 not out off 51 balls — his highest score in T20 cricket — and a 26-run over featuring four consecutive sixes off Digvesh Rathi turned a losing KKR chase into a tied scoreline that went to a Super Over at Ekana on 26 April 2026. KKR eventually won the Super Over.
Lucknow Super Giants vs Kolkata Knight Riders
26 April 2026
Sunil Narine bowled the IPL Super Over of the season in KKR's 26 April 2026 tied match against LSG at Ekana. He conceded one run and took two wickets in three balls, dismantling the LSG batting before KKR sealed the chase in a single delivery.
Lucknow Super Giants vs Kolkata Knight Riders
26 April 2026
Mohsin Khan produced career-best figures of 5/23 against KKR at Ekana on 26 April 2026 — the LSG left-arm seamer's first IPL five-for. The bowling effort was eventually overshadowed by Mohammed Shami's final-ball six and Sunil Narine's Super Over for KKR, but the spell will stand in Mohsin's career as the night he announced himself as a death-overs specialist.
Gujarat Titans vs Punjab Kings
4 May 2026
Washington Sundar finished a tense GT chase of Punjab Kings on 4 May 2026 by scooping Marcus Stoinis for six over fine leg. The 40 not out off 23 balls, with Sai Sudharsan's earlier fifty as the platform, secured the win in the final over and added another late-overs partnership masterclass to GT's IPL 2026 tactical repertoire.
Lucknow Super Giants vs Kolkata Knight Riders
26 April 2026
With seven runs needed off the final ball of KKR's chase against LSG at Ekana on 26 April 2026, KKR No.10 Mohammed Shami launched a Kartik Tyagi half-volley over long-off for six to tie the match. The hit set up the Super Over that Sunil Narine then won for KKR.
Gujarat Titans
5 May 2026
Kagiso Rabada led the IPL 2026 wicket-takers' chart through the league phase with 16 wickets and a tournament-leading impact score of 492.33 — the bowling spine of GT's playoff-bound campaign and the most consistent fast-bowling performance of the season.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru
5 May 2026
Bhuvneshwar Kumar took 17 wickets through the IPL 2026 league phase — second on the season's wicket-takers chart behind Kagiso Rabada — and produced one of the most distinctive personal resurgences of the campaign for Royal Challengers Bengaluru. After several seasons in which his swing-bowling craft had been considered past its peak, his IPL 2026 was a return to the form that had defined him a decade earlier.
Gujarat Titans vs Punjab Kings
4 May 2026
Gujarat Titans' 4 May 2026 last-over win against Punjab Kings was constructed by two innings: Sai Sudharsan's anchoring fifty in the chase, and Washington Sundar's match-finishing 40 not out off 23 balls including the scoop-six off Marcus Stoinis. The two innings together formed one of the season's most complete last-over chases.
Chennai Super Kings
5 May 2026
Sanju Samson produced one of his most consistent IPL seasons in 2026, finishing the league phase with 402 runs and an impact score of 483.23 — second only to 15-year-old Vaibhav Suryavanshi on IPL 2026's batting impact chart. After an off-season move from Rajasthan Royals to Chennai Super Kings, Samson's form was one of the structural reasons for CSK's mid-table competitiveness.
Rajasthan Royals vs Punjab Kings
28 April 2026
Rajasthan Royals captain Riyan Parag was caught on broadcast vaping in the team dressing room during RR's 28 April 2026 match against Punjab Kings — a Level 1 breach of the IPL Code of Conduct (Article 2.21, "conduct that brings the game into disrepute") that led to a 25 per cent match-fee fine and one demerit point. The incident reignited debate about senior-player behaviour and franchise discipline at the IPL's youngest captaincy.
Mumbai Indians
5 May 2026
Hardik Pandya's IPL 2026 with Mumbai Indians has produced the lowest captaincy win rate in MI's franchise history — 40.54 per cent — and a four-match losing streak that left the side on the wrong side of the playoff race. Speculation about whether Rohit Sharma or Suryakumar Yadav should take back the captaincy ran through the season, sharpened by a public Bumrah-Pandya field-placement clash on 16 April and Ravichandran Ashwin's "underwhelmed" comment on broadcast.
Lucknow Super Giants
5 May 2026
Rishabh Pant's first season as Lucknow Super Giants captain has produced LSG's worst IPL campaign — 4 points from 9 matches and bottom of the IPL 2026 table — alongside personal form below his historical standards. Public commentary has called for him to step down from the captaincy and focus on his batting; LSG's franchise leadership has not yet acted.
Sunrisers Hyderabad
5 May 2026
Sunrisers Hyderabad's IPL 2026 produced internal franchise discussion about whether Ishan Kishan should take over the SRH captaincy from Pat Cummins. The Cummins-Kishan internal debate, reported across cricket media, saw the franchise eventually back Cummins through the season — partly on the strength of his bowling contribution, partly on the difficulty of switching captains mid-tournament.
BCCI / IPL franchises
5 May 2026
Cricket reporting in early May 2026 indicated that the BCCI was preparing stricter rules around player partners, family travel, and dressing-room visitors at IPL franchises — reforms collectively described in the press as a 'girlfriend culture' crackdown. The proposals, attributed to BCCI sources but not formally announced, drew immediate public commentary about player welfare, privacy and franchise discipline.
Mumbai Indians vs Royal Challengers Bengaluru
12 April 2026
Rohit Sharma sustained a hamstring injury during MI's 12 April 2026 match against Royal Challengers Bengaluru and missed at least three subsequent matches as a result. The injury, suffered during a stretching shot, came at a moment when MI's struggling 2026 campaign could not afford the loss of its most experienced batter.
Mumbai Indians
April 2026
Ravichandran Ashwin, working as a broadcast analyst during IPL 2026, said publicly that he was "underwhelmed" with Hardik Pandya's Mumbai Indians captaincy — a rare on-air criticism from a fellow active senior international that became a recurring reference point in MI's mid-season captaincy debate.
BCCI / IPL
March 2026
The IPL announced ahead of the 2026 season that it had scrapped the rule mandating a one-match suspension for captains after three slow over-rate offences in a season. Captains and players will now face fines and in-game field-restriction penalties only — a significant softening of the disciplinary regime that has produced multiple over-rate fines without any captain suspensions across IPL 2026.
Sunrisers Hyderabad
2 April 2026
Sunrisers Hyderabad opener Abhishek Sharma was fined and given one demerit point for a Code of Conduct breach in an early IPL 2026 match — one of the season's first formal disciplinary actions, and a marker for what would become a busier-than-usual sanction season for the IPL match referee.
Rajasthan Royals
30 April 2026
Within 48 hours of Riyan Parag's vaping fine, multiple cricket outlets reported Rajasthan Royals' senior leadership considering Yashasvi Jaiswal or Ravindra Jadeja as alternative captaincy options. The franchise eventually issued a statement reaffirming Parag in the role, but the public speculation was the most visible captaincy debate at any IPL franchise outside Mumbai Indians.
Canada vs New Zealand
April 2026
Indian press reporting in April 2026 connected the alleged fixing infrastructure behind the ICC ACU's Canada-New Zealand T20 World Cup probe to international organised-crime figures, with names including Lawrence Bishnoi appearing in headlines. The ICC has declined to confirm any such link and has urged caution; the connection remains unverified by the formal investigation.
Cricket Canada
10 April 2026
The CBC documentary 'Corruption, Crime and Cricket' broadcast on 10 April 2026 included the existence of a recorded telephonic conversation involving former Cricket Canada coach Khurram Chohan that the documentary's producers said was relevant to the ACU's match-fixing probe. CBC declined to publish the full audio in the broadcast, citing legal and procedural reasons; the recording has been provided in full to ICC officials.
Cricket Canada
10 April 2026
Former Cricket Canada coach Pubudu Dassanayake claimed on camera in the CBC documentary 'Corruption, Crime and Cricket' that he had been threatened by Cricket Canada with contract termination if certain players were not selected. The claim is the third strand of the documentary's allegations against Cricket Canada governance and points at administrative interference rather than at on-field fixing.
Mumbai Indians vs Chennai Super Kings
April 2026
Mumbai Indians' use of Shardul Thakur as concussion replacement for Mitchell Santner during their Wankhede match against CSK in April 2026 placed the IPL's like-for-like concussion-substitution rule under public scrutiny. Critics argued that an all-rounder for a frontline spinner was not a like-for-like swap. MI's coaching staff, led by Mahela Jayawardene, defended the call as procedurally correct.
Delhi Capitals vs Punjab Kings
25 April 2026
Delhi Capitals pacer Lungi Ngidi fell awkwardly while attempting to catch PBKS opener Priyansh Arya in DC's IPL 2026 match on 25 April 2026 and sustained a head injury. He was withdrawn from the match under the concussion protocol; Vipraj Nigam was named as the concussion substitute. Ngidi missed several subsequent matches before completing the mandatory concussion layoff.
Kolkata Knight Riders vs Lucknow Super Giants
April 2026
Following the public controversy over Angkrish Raghuvanshi's 26 April 2026 'obstructing the field' dismissal, the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) — guardians of the Laws of Cricket — issued a formal clarification backing the third umpire's call. The MCC stated that Raghuvanshi had wilfully obstructed by taking a route that wasn't the most direct way to the other end, drifting off the strip and into the path of Mohammed Shami's throw.
Punjab Kings
April 2026
PBKS captain Shreyas Iyer was fined twice for slow over-rate offences in IPL 2026 — a 12-lakh fine after the GT match and a 24-lakh fine after the CSK match, totalling 36 lakh in personal fines. With the IPL's previous one-match suspension rule scrapped pre-season, neither fine carried a ban; PBKS's other players were each fined 6 lakh or 25 per cent of match fee per offence.
Kolkata Knight Riders
April 2026
KKR captain Ajinkya Rahane was fined 12 lakh for a slow over-rate offence after KKR failed to complete their quota of 20 overs within the stipulated time in an IPL 2026 fixture. The rest of the KKR XI was fined 25 per cent of match fee per player. The fine joins the IPL 2026 cumulative captaincy over-rate fine total that has produced the season's highest such figure in tournament history.
Sunrisers Hyderabad vs Punjab Kings
6 May 2026
Shashank Singh's IPL 2026 fielding curse continued at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium on 6 May 2026 when he dropped Heinrich Klaasen off Yuzvendra Chahal's bowling — a slog sweep that flew straight to him at the boundary, sat in his hands for a fraction of a second, and slipped out. PBKS fans on social media were unforgiving.
Punjab Kings
6 May 2026
Punjab Kings' 16 dropped catches in 10 matches — joint most in IPL 2026 alongside Chennai Super Kings — has converted the franchise's fielding lapses into a season-long story arc. Shashank Singh, with three drops in a single LSG match alone, has been the public face of the trend; head coach Ricky Ponting has compared the catching slump to a 'virus.'
Punjab Kings
May 2026
PBKS head coach Ricky Ponting summarised his side's fielding crisis in IPL 2026 with two lines that became the season's most-shared coaching quotes: 'It's like a virus. We've put a lot of catches down so far this season,' and the affectionate-exasperated 'It just looks like the ball is following him around everywhere he goes' — directed specifically at Shashank Singh's run of drops.
Sunrisers Hyderabad vs Punjab Kings
6 May 2026
Three different Punjab Kings fielders dropped catches in a single match against Sunrisers Hyderabad on 6 May 2026 at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium — Lockie Ferguson, Aaron Connolly and Shashank Singh — turning a difficult evening into the most public single-match collapse of the season's PBKS fielding crisis.
IPL franchises
April 2026
A single day of IPL 2026 produced 986 runs across two fixtures — the highest total of the season and one of the highest in IPL history. Cricket-statistical analysis attributed the bulk of the inflation to substandard fielding rather than to flat pitches or short boundaries, with multiple dropped sitters across both matches converting under-par totals into 200-plus innings.
Punjab Kings
6 May 2026
PBKS captain Shreyas Iyer's understated post-match line — 'a bit too much dropped catches today' — after Punjab's 6 May 2026 SRH match became the season's most-shared captain quote. The understatement, in the context of three different PBKS fielders dropping catches in a single match, captured the franchise's exhausted resignation about its season-long catching crisis.
Sunrisers Hyderabad vs Punjab Kings
May 2026
Heinrich Klaasen's IPL 2026 record against Punjab Kings reads like the index page of a fielding-textbook chapter on dropped catches. He has been put down by PBKS fielders at least three times across two fixtures, with each lifeline converting into a meaningful score. Klaasen's series of low-30s innings extended to 60s and 70s by the time the catches were finally taken — when, indeed, they ever were.
Sunrisers Hyderabad vs Punjab Kings
6 May 2026
Ishan Kishan was lifelined by a PBKS dropped catch at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium on 6 May 2026 and converted the reprieve into a sixty that helped SRH win comfortably. The drop joined the same match's catalogue of three different PBKS fielders putting down catches — the season's most public single-match collapse of the visiting franchise's fielding standards.
IPL franchises
May 2026
Multiple concussion-substitution cases in IPL 2026 — including Mitchell Santner replaced by Shardul Thakur (MI), Lungi Ngidi replaced by Vipraj Nigam (DC), and others — have placed the like-for-like principle of the IPL's concussion-replacement rule under public scrutiny. The Santner-Thakur swap drew the loudest criticism for being arguably not like-for-like; other cases have been procedurally cleaner.
MCC / All Cricket
1 May 2026
The 2026 edition of the MCC Laws of Cricket formalises a long-debated administrative reclassification: Mankading — running out the non-striker for backing up before the bowler has released the ball — is now officially classified as a run-out under Law 38.3. The reclassification removes the dismissal from cricket's "unfair play" implications and treats it as the routine procedural dismissal it has always been technically.
ICC / All Cricket
May 2026
The ICC has officially confirmed that retired out is a valid and legal dismissal — formal acknowledgement of a tactic that several T20 franchises have been using since the early 2020s. The clarification removes lingering ambiguity about whether the dismissal is acceptable under the Laws and gives franchises certainty for in-match tactical decisions.
ICC / IPL / All Cricket
May 2026
Following a string of contested boundary-catch decisions across IPL 2026 — Klaasen's catch by Phil Salt, Finn Allen's catch by Digvesh Rathi, Rajat Patidar's catch by Jason Holder — the ICC announced a structural reform requiring all standard third-umpire feeds for boundary catches to include the top-down boundary-cushion angle. The reform addresses a procedural gap that had been visible across multiple high-profile dismissals.
BCCI / IPL franchises
March 2026
The BCCI tightened the IPL's under-18 player welfare protocols ahead of the 2026 season, in direct response to Vaibhav Suryavanshi's 2025 emergence as a 14-year-old IPL centurion. The new protocols include mandatory rest windows, restrictions on night-match attendance for the youngest players, and a personal mentor relationship — Suryavanshi was paired with Sachin Tendulkar — for under-18 IPL contractees.
BCCI / IPL franchises
April 2026
Following the Romi Bhinder phone-in-dugout case in April 2026, the BCCI issued an internal clarification of PMOA (Player and Match Officials Areas) Article 4.1.1 — the rule that prohibits team managers from using phones in the dugout. The clarification reinforces the rule's strict application across all franchises and stipulates additional briefing requirements for support staff at the start of each season.
ICC / All Cricket
1 May 2026
Effective from 1 May 2026, the ICC has updated its equipment regulations — covering helmets, pads, gloves and protective gear — as part of the broader 2026 playing-conditions package. The updates align with the MCC 2026 Laws of Cricket revisions and tighten the safety requirements for all international and ICC-sanctioned cricket.
ICC / IPL / International T20
May 2026
The ICC's stop-clock rule, expanded in the May 2026 playing-conditions package to include an automatic 5-run penalty on the third breach in any innings, has had measurable effect across early international T20 fixtures since the rule took effect on 1 May 2026. ICC officials have indicated the rule is producing the over-rate improvement that earlier financial penalties alone had not.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru Women vs Delhi Capitals Women
5 February 2026
Royal Challengers Bengaluru Women won their second Women's Premier League title on 5 February 2026, beating Delhi Capitals Women by 6 wickets in the WPL 2026 Final at the BCA Stadium, Vadodara. The match featured the Smriti Mandhana vs Jemimah Rodrigues captaincy duel and consolidated RCB-W as the WPL's most successful franchise.
WPL franchises
January 2026
The 2026 Women's Premier League was played across only two venues rather than the IPL-style home-and-away format that some sections of cricket commentary had advocated for. The BCCI's logistics-and-broadcast-efficiency framing of the decision drew criticism from women's-cricket advocates who argued that the format was holding the WPL back from its full development potential.
Chennai Super Kings
3 February 2026
Chennai Super Kings CEO Kasi Viswanathan announced on 3 February 2026 that the franchise was actively planning to participate in the WPL when the league next expands its franchise count. MS Dhoni was named as expected to be a key part of the CSK Women's management structure if and when the franchise is admitted.
Mumbai Indians
April 2026
Mumbai Indians head coach Mahela Jayawardene used the post-match press conference following the Santner-Thakur concussion substitution at Wankhede to publicly clarify the IPL's like-for-like protocol — confirming MI had followed the rule exactly and that the match referee's approval had been procedurally sound.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru vs Sunrisers Hyderabad
22 March 2026
The first controversy of IPL 2026 arrived in the tournament's opening match. Sunrisers Hyderabad batter Heinrich Klaasen was given out for 31 off 22 balls when Phil Salt held a low catch at the deep boundary off Romario Shepherd's bowling. Third umpire Rohan Pandit, working with the angles available to him during the review, ruled the catch fair on the basis of inconclusive evidence. Minutes later, broadcasters aired a top-angle replay that had not been provided during the review and which appeared to show the boundary cushion moving as Salt completed the take. Klaasen, by then walking off, was filmed in a heated exchange with the fourth umpire near the boundary rope.
Delhi Capitals vs Gujarat Titans
8 April 2026
Delhi Capitals lost a chase against Gujarat Titans by exactly one run in IPL 2026 — the same one run they had been denied earlier in the innings under cricket's "dead ball after on-field decision" rule. In the 10th over, Nitish Rana was given out lbw on the field, completed a single while waiting for the review, and was then ruled not out on DRS. Under the prevailing IPL playing condition, the single did not count: the ball had become dead at the moment of the original out call. Gujarat won 210-4 to Delhi's 209-8, with David Miller falling agonisingly short and Kuldeep Yadav run out off the final ball.
Chennai Super Kings vs Delhi Capitals
11 April 2026
Delhi Capitals batter Nitish Rana was fined 25 per cent of his match fee and given one demerit point for an audible obscenity directed at fourth umpire Anish Sahasrabudhe during Delhi's defeat to Chennai Super Kings on 11 April 2026. The flashpoint came when Tristan Stubbs's request for a glove change — driven by Chennai's heavy humidity — was denied at the boundary rope. Rana, batting at the other end and watching the exchange, walked over to argue and crossed into Code of Conduct territory. The match referee judged the breach a Level 1 offence and Rana accepted the sanction.
Kolkata Knight Riders vs Lucknow Super Giants
9 April 2026
Kolkata Knight Riders opener Finn Allen was given out for 9 in the second over of his side's IPL 2026 chase against Lucknow Super Giants at Eden Gardens, after Digvesh Rathi took a low catch at the deep third boundary. Replays appeared to show Rathi's left foot brushing the rope. The on-field umpire ruled the catch fair without referring it upstairs; the third umpire later confirmed the decision under fan and broadcaster criticism, prompting KKR to issue a public statement that the call "should have gone upstairs" first.
Mumbai Indians vs Punjab Kings
16 April 2026
Mumbai Indians captain Hardik Pandya and senior bowler Jasprit Bumrah were involved in a visible on-field disagreement over field placements during MI's defeat to Punjab Kings at the Wankhede Stadium on 16 April 2026. The incident, broadcast live, came during PBKS's chase as Prabhsimran Singh — eventually 80 not out and player of the match — was building his innings. After Bumrah dropped a catch from Pandya's bowling, Pandya was filmed reacting angrily towards his senior bowler. The defeat was MI's fourth in a row.
Rajasthan Royals vs Royal Challengers Bengaluru
10 April 2026
Rajasthan Royals team manager Ravinder Singh "Romi" Bhinder was caught on television using a mobile phone in the team dugout during the franchise's IPL 2026 match against Royal Challengers Bengaluru in Guwahati on 10 April 2026, in breach of Article 4.1.1 of the BCCI's IPL Player and Match Officials Areas (PMOA) Protocols. The BCCI's Anti-Corruption and Security Unit (ACSU) issued a show-cause notice the same week. After investigation, Bhinder was fined ₹1 lakh and given a formal warning; his explanation that a medical condition required phone access was accepted. No action was taken against fifteen-year-old prodigy Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, who had been seated next to him.
IPL franchise match
8 April 2026
David Miller inexplicably refused an obvious single on the penultimate ball, then failed to score on the last ball, costing his team a match they lost by 1 run.