Two Teams That Could Still Reach the Final Four of the 2026 IPL Despite Disappointing Starts

Nobody was writing comeback narratives when the Rajasthan Royals were four games into this campaign. Four wins. Four different victims. Now, things have changed a little.

Rajasthan’s Blistering Start

Riyan Parag's men were surgically dismantling every team they met — Chennai swept aside at Sawai Mansingh, Mumbai thrashed in a rain-reduced eleven-over contest where Yashasvi Jaiswal hit 77 off 32 balls and made it look almost embarrassingly easy, and then RCB overhauled in a chase that never really felt in doubt. The bookmakers have since installed them as the early favourites, and how could they not have? One prominent Canadian online casino offering sports betting currently positions them as the 7/2 joint favourites to end the year as champions, level with Virat Kohli's Royal Challengers Bangalore.

Just as the bookies were crowning the Royals as champions-elect, though, Ishan Kishan turned up at Rajiv Gandhi Stadium and reminded everyone how quickly a narrative can shatter. Ninety-one off 44 balls — a brutal exhibition of calculated savagery. Debutant Sakib Hussain took four wickets as Rajasthan folded for 159 chasing 217. The team that looked untouchable suddenly looked mortal.

Beneath them in the standings, two other squads with pedigree, firepower, and unfinished business felt the door crack open. They haven't made the best start to the season, but that's exactly why their odds to finish in the top four at the end of the regular season are so high. Let's take a look at them.

Mumbai Indians

Picture the Wankhede dugout on April 11th. Suryakumar Yadav, who scored 51 against Delhi four days earlier, before his side still somehow lost, sat somewhere between frustration and bewilderment. Hardik Pandya, fielding questions about a batting collapse in a rain-reduced game against Rajasthan, where Mumbai posted 123 chasing 151 off 11 overs. Ryan Rickelton — brilliant on debut, 81 off 43 against KKR in a record run-chase that gave everyone exactly the wrong impression of how this campaign was about to go — now sitting with the rest of them, three losses in the last three games and no clean answers available.

One win and three losses. NRR of -0.772. Eighth place. For any other franchise, this is a problem. For Mumbai, the most decorated franchise in IPL history — five titles, more finals appearances than anyone cares to count — this is something deeper than a bad run. It's an identity crisis. The team that defined franchise cricket dominance is now occupying the same bracket as a Chennai Super Kings side that conceded 250 to RCB.

But here's the thing about Mumbai specifically: they've been here. Last year, one win from their first five games, everyone sharpening their pens for the autopsy — and then something clicked. Six wins in a row. Yadav has accumulated 717 runs for the campaign. Trent Boult taking 22 wickets as the most dangerous new-ball operator in the competition. Final four. Eliminator win over Gujarat. What clicked wasn't a tactical masterclass; it was simpler and more terrifying than that. It was Jasprit Bumrah finding his rhythm.

Bumrah hasn't bowled a truly unplayable spell yet in 2026. Not one. He's been present, quietly accurate, but not yet the bowler who makes batters genuinely want to leave the field. When that spell arrives — the slower ball gripping off the pitch, the yorker zeroed into the blockhole at 145kph, the bouncer that climbs into the ribcage from nowhere — this team transforms. The market at 4/5 is pure pattern recognition.

Gujarat Titans

April 8th in Delhi. One run. Gujarat Titans needing one run off the last ball of their chase to beat Delhi Capitals, Shubman Gill 70 off 45 balls, and yet still not quite enough until it suddenly, barely, was. One run separates a dressing room that drifts from a dressing room that believes. The difference in cricket's psychology is immeasurable — and Gujarat's players walked off knowing they'd found something when they needed it most.

That win — and it was a near-miss, too, a single ball from collapse — tells you everything about where Gujarat are right now. Technically fifth, two wins and two losses, NRR of -0.029. Nearly neutral. That's the number that matters most, actually. While Mumbai are bleeding -0.772, while Chennai are hemorrhaging at -1.532, Gujarat have essentially balanced their arithmetic across four competitive games. In the final week of the league stage, when a decimal point might separate two teams, and NRR decides who plays in an Eliminator and who flies home, that -0.029 is worth several more points than it currently appears.

The Jos Buttler-Gill axis hasn't exploded simultaneously yet. When Gujarat spent ₹15.75 crore on Jos Buttler, they were buying a specific partnership — the English destroyer and the Indian captain feeding off each other's confidence at the top of an innings. That partnership, against a pace-heavy attack in Ahmedabad, is a lit fuse.

Buttler finally showed glimpses against LSG with 60 off 37 balls. Gill contributed his 70 against DC. But they haven't clicked in the same innings yet. When they do, and Rashid Khan is turning the middle overs into a spin web that's strangled KL Rahul for 3/17 in four overs already this tournament — the ceiling is genuinely frightening. At 2.75, bookmakers are treating Gujarat like a concern. They're a delayed explosion.