Shubman Gill Has 329 Reasons to Love This Fixture — and Rashid Khan Has Seven
Match: Punjab Kings vs Gujarat Titans | IPL 2026 Match 4
Venue: Maharaja Yadavindra Singh International Cricket Stadium, Mullanpur
Time: 7:30 PM IST, 31 March 2026
Six IPL meetings. Three wins each. An average first-innings score of 178. A fixture so evenly matched it barely exists on paper until the ball starts swinging — then it produces some of the most compelling individual battles in the competition.
This is Punjab Kings vs Gujarat Titans, and Tuesday's game at Mullanpur will be no different.
Key Battles
Rashid Khan vs Marcus Stoinis
This one is simple. In 51 balls across their T20 career, Rashid Khan has dismissed Marcus Stoinis four times and conceded just 54 runs at a strike rate of 105. That is not a battle — that is a mismatch.
Stoinis will likely bat in the top five for Punjab. Rashid will bowl overs five, six, or somewhere in the middle. When those paths cross, the data is unambiguous about who comes out ahead. Check the full matchup on the Matchup Explorer.
Contrast that with Liam Livingstone's record against the same bowler: 198 runs from 101 balls at a strike rate of 196, but also dismissed four times. Livingstone takes on Rashid and scores — he just doesn't always survive it. Over 101 balls that produces results. Over 30, it's a gamble.
The tactical question for PBKS isn't whether to attack Rashid — it's which batter they trust to absorb the risk.
| Batter | Balls | Runs | SR | Dismissals |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LS Livingstone | 101 | 198 | 196.0 | 4 |
| MP Stoinis | 51 | 54 | 105.9 | 4 |
Yuzvendra Chahal vs Shubman Gill
Shubman Gill has scored 329 runs in this fixture at a strike rate of 160.5. He is the standout batter across all six meetings — 72 more runs than the next best (Sai Sudharsan, 257). His record in these games is remarkable.
Against Yuzvendra Chahal, though, the story changes. Gill has scored 62 from 51 balls at a strike rate of 121.57 with two dismissals. That is well below his IPL average output. Chahal slows him down, forces dot balls, and twice found the edge. Explore Gill's stats on his player profile.
Punjab have signed Chahal specifically for situations like this — tying down batters who would otherwise run away with the game. If he can replicate that form early in Gill's innings, GT will be scrambling through their middle order.
The Ground: What Mullanpur Does
The only time this fixture has been played at Mullanpur was in April 2024. Punjab made 142/9. Gujarat chased it down in 18.5 overs with three wickets to spare. A low-scoring, seam-friendly afternoon that sat completely at odds with the five other meetings, which averaged 178 first-innings runs.
That was partly conditions, partly occasion — Punjab's top order collapsed. The pitch at Mullanpur tends to assist pace bowlers early, with lateral movement available in the powerplay. It is not a ground that consistently produces 200-plus totals.
The Venue Explorer carries full batting and bowling breakdowns. For GT, it is a ground they have already won at. For Punjab, it is a home fixture they will want to erase from memory.
What it means strategically: whoever wins the toss and reads the surface correctly gets a significant advantage. A 165-170 total batting first could be a winning score. A 190 target batting second looks very achievable. The margin between them is the pitch.
Head-to-Head
Punjab Kings and Gujarat Titans have met six times in the IPL. Each team has won three. Not one game has been decided by more than 11 runs or more than six wickets. This is genuinely the most tightly contested bilateral record in the competition.
The most recent meeting (March 2025) produced the highest combined score in the fixture's history: Punjab 243/5, Gujarat 232/4. Ten runs between the sides in a game where both teams passed 230. Before that, Gujarat chased down 200 with three wickets to win in 2024.
Averages across all six games:
| Phase | Run Rate | Dot Ball % |
|---|---|---|
| Powerplay | 8.54 | 39.7% |
| Middle overs | 7.95 | 27.6% |
| Death | 10.93 | 14.2% |
The death-over run rate of 10.93 across this fixture is high. Both sides have bowlers who leak runs late — and both sides have batters capable of cashing in. It is almost always decided in overs 17 to 20.
Gujarat's most effective bowler in this fixture is Rashid (seven wickets at an economy of 7.42). He has been the difference-maker in the meetings Gujarat have won.
It is a fixture without a favourite. It has rarely produced a comfortable winner. At Mullanpur, on a pitch that can do something early, the side that loses fewer wickets in the powerplay and sets up their death batting will take it.
Build your own stats view for every player in this game on the Stat Builder.