Lucknow Super Giants may have ended Sunday night on the wrong side of a heavy defeat, but Prince Yadav still came away with something tangible: a place among the leading wicket-takers of IPL 2026. After his 2 for 25 against Punjab Kings in New Chandigarh, the young quick moved to 11 wickets for the season and into the top three of the Purple Cap race. Updated standings put Anshul Kamboj in front with 13, while Prince is level on 11 with Prasidh Krishna, leaving him effectively in a share of second place.
That shift came in a game that had very little mercy in it for bowlers. Punjab Kings piled up 254 for 7, the highest total of IPL 2026 so far, powered mainly by Priyansh Arya’s 93 and Cooper Connolly’s 87 in a blistering 182-run stand. Lucknow never really got close in the chase, and Punjab sealed a 54-run win to strengthen their grip near the top of the table. In the middle of all that chaos, Prince’s spell stood out because, honestly, there was damage everywhere else. He was one of the few bowlers who managed to keep some control.
His figures matter beyond the scoreline too. On a night when Punjab’s batters were flying and the match turned into another IPL run-fest, Prince still found a way to strike twice and keep his economy respectable. That is usually what pushes a bowler into these cap races — not just wickets, but wickets taken in difficult conditions, under pressure, when almost everyone else is getting hit. Sunday felt like that kind of evening.
Earlier in the day, Kolkata Knight Riders beat Rajasthan Royals by four wickets at Eden Gardens, with Varun Chakravarthy finishing with 3 for 14 and Rinku Singh guiding the chase with an unbeaten 53. That result helped reshape the broader statistical conversation around the league on Sunday, but by the end of the night the bigger movement in the bowling charts belonged to Prince Yadav, whose steady rise is becoming harder to ignore.
For Lucknow, the defeat hurt. For Prince, though, it was another nudge forward in what is turning into a serious breakout campaign. The Purple Cap table changes quickly in a tournament like this, sometimes in a single spell, sometimes in one expensive over. Still, being in the top three this deep into the early phase of the season is no fluke. Prince Yadav is right in the race now, and that’s the part LSG will want to hold onto as they regroup.
