RCB's Krunal Pandya escorts DC skipper Axar Patel off-field after latter gets retired hurt

Unfortunately for Delhi Capitals, their skipper Axar Patel was retired hurt and had to leave his batting midway after being well-set in a tricky run chase against Royal Challengers Bengaluru at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium in Match 26 of IPL 2026 on Saturday, April 18. As it turned out, RCB's Krunal Pandya helped get Axar off the field alongside Ashutosh Sharma, showing some great sportsmanship.

Axar made 26 off just 19 balls and brought DC quite close to victory alongside other batters. However, cramps caused the star all-rounder to leave his batting. RCB's team physiotherapist was seen attending to a pained Axar with the DC team physiotherapist being unavailable. As a result, Krunal and Ashutosh gave their support to crutch the Gujarat cricketer off the field.

DC, however, managed to win the nail-biting contest with a ball to spare, courtesy of a decent half-century by Tristan Stubbs. David Miller (22 off 10), meanwhile, was the star with the bat for his brief cameo that included a couple of sixes and a boundary in the last over to pull things completely in favour of the visiting side, as they won by six wickets.

Earlier in the run chase, KL Rahul had also shone with a bat with an impressive half-century. His knock kept DC in the hunt, and the birthday boy was also involved in an important partnership with other top-order batters to steer the innings nicely. Acting as the stand-in captain in Axar's unavailability, Rahul also reflected his raw thoughts on the win.

"The wicket did a little bit early on. I could see Virat and Phil Salt not happy with the way the ball was coming on. Us losing three wickets in the first six didn't make it easy for us. So yeah, it was, I think all in all a really good cricket game. (Plan after losing three quick wickets) The conversation was to continue to play good cricket shots and see how we can find boundaries and how we can still put the pressure on the bowlers," Rahul said after the match.

"We didn't want to go into our shell, and then the run rate keeps climbing up; it gets harder and harder towards the end. We saw that when we bowled as well, when there was a little bit of reverse swing as well and the opposition has some really good death bowlers as well. So we didn't want to take it too deep. We just wanted to stay in the moment, take it one over at a time and try and put pressure on the bowlers. And yeah, he hit some good shots. I hit some good shots. As it turned out, it did go quite deep," he added.

Axar's injury isn't serious, though, and the Capitals' skipper is expected to lead them in their next fixture as well. An official announcement regarding his recovery is currently awaited, though.