There were some concerns and more than a few raised eyebrows at the start of IPL 2025 when Gujarat Titans revealed that Jos Buttler would bat at No. 3. The Englishman, surprisingly released by Rajasthan Royals, is one of the great white-ball batters of his generation and had built a remarkable IPL career as an opener. The Titans instead chose to elevate Sai Sudharsan alongside captain Shubman Gill, a decision that has since become one of the defining features of their success.
Last year, they amassed 912 partnership runs at a run rate of 9.56. This season, they have raised the tempo to 10.56 while still retaining remarkable consistency, reaching 886 runs together. Another 54-run stand in Sunday’s final would take them past the all-time IPL record set by the legendary Royal Challengers Bengaluru pair of Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers during their groundbreaking 2016 campaign.
Like Kohli and de Villiers before them, Gill believes a strong personal equation underpins their success at the crease.
“You know we spend a lot of time in the IPL together on the field, off field as well and then we are in the Test team as well, so we have a lot of conversations. There are things that we talk about cricket, outside of cricket,” Gill said ahead of the final.
“But I think there are many players in our team who also play for the country and hopefully we are going to play together for a long period of time and it’s very important for us to have to know each other well to have a great equation that automatically translates to on-field performances.”
Gill also credited Sudharsan’s unwavering intensity and discipline away from the game as key reasons behind his success, suggesting that consistency across a two-month tournament remains among the hardest qualities to master. Before his Orange Cap-winning exploits last season, Sudharsan had been advised by the GT management to conserve his energy through the campaign. Long net sessions are largely restricted to matchday minus two, but preparation hardly stops there. Yoga, meditation and extensive visualisation occupy much of his time on the eve of games, when he is often encouraged to stay away from the nets.
“I think in a tournament like IPL, when I first started playing, one of the challenges that I faced was to keep playing the matches at the same intensity and I think that is one of his [Sai Sudharsan’s] biggest strength,” Gill said.
“You play so many matches there could be days where mentally you don’t feel up to the mark or physically you don’t feel up to the mark but to be able to have the same intensity in all of the matches and be consistent in your preparation [and] in your routine is not that easy. He is someone who is very consistent in his routines, in his life outside of cricket… so that is what makes him consistent on the field as well.”
While the IPL has increasingly become associated with towering sixes and ever-rising totals, Gill believes many of batting’s oldest principles remain intact. The ability to find gaps, rotate strike and minimise dot balls, he argued, continues to separate good batting sides from great ones.
“Sometimes the wicket tends to be a bit on the slower side. Then it is important to hit the gaps, still look to run well because I think that is the foundation of any format you are playing. The team that plays less number of dot balls has a better chance of getting a better score, so yes the T20 game has evolved, you see bigger scores but the wickets have also gone a little bit flatter…”
Gill then pointed to changing scheduling dynamics and fresher surfaces as a significant factor behind the surge in high-scoring matches in recent seasons.
“I think that not many people talk about this, before these two new teams [GT & LSG were added to the league in 2022] there used to be eight teams and we used to play on similar wickets. [But] back in the day in the second half of the IPL, we used to see 150, 160, 140 scores a lot more, in Eden Gardens and even in Bombay.
“In some of the venues now, because at least four or five times in a season, we get a five-day break or a seven-day break, which gives the chance to play on fresh wickets, better wickets. So I feel cricket is the same, it’s all about the kind of wickets that we play on, the kind of grounds that we play on… If we play on challenging wickets, the scores are going to be similar, maybe a 5-10 runs difference here and there but still I feel that cricket is pretty much similar.”
Gill himself has adapted to the changing demands of T20 batting, particularly in the IPL’s Impact Player era. His Powerplay strike rate has jumped from 143.14 last season to 159.20 this year. The 26-year-old, who now captains India in Tests and ODIs but lost his place in the T20I side before this year’s successful World Cup defence, reiterated his desire to keep evolving regardless of format.
“I mean I’d be happy to play if I get picked for the T20 team but honestly I want to keep working on my game. It doesn’t matter what format it is. I want to keep getting better as a T20 batsman, as an ODI batsman, as a Test batsman… cricket is such a game you can never really get perfect but obviously you can strive for it and that’s what I try to do.”
For now, though, his attention is fixed on winning a second IPL title and a first as captain. Gujarat head into the final after a demanding stretch that has taken them from Dharamsala to Mullanpur and now to Ahmedabad in the space of five days. While RCB, having sealed a direct berth through Qualifier 1, have enjoyed a longer break, Gill played down the significance of the physical disparity.
“Yeah, I mean Dharamshala is kind of a difficult venue to get there and travel, but yes physically they might have an advantage but I think finals are all about mental [strength], so the team that is mentally up there for the challenge is the one that is going to win.”
If fatigue forms one side of the equation, familiarity forms the other. Back at their home venue for the title decider, Gill views Ahmedabad as an advantage rather than a burden.
“Honestly I don’t really get burden of expectations. Obviously there are advantages, that’s how I see it. There’s familiarity when we play there, we know the wicket, we know the ground so we know what kind of cricket we need to play there to be able to win so in that context yes I see it as an advantage because there’s a little bit of familiarity.”