Royal Challengers Bangalore vs Sunrisers Hyderabad: All Eyes on Virat Kohli

Today, Saturday, March 28th, marks the beginning of the 19th season of the Indian Premier League (IPL 2026), with a major match between Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) and Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH), the former being the home team at M. Chinnaswamy Stadium. In this match, Virat Kohli of RCB, the star batsman of the team, is likely to create a new record in the history of Twenty20 cricket by scoring 29 runs, thus breaking the existing record of the famous Pakistani all-rounder Shoaib Malik.

Virat Kohli has played 414 matches for India, RCB, and Delhi from 2007 to 2025. In 397 innings, Virat has scored 13,543 runs, including 9 centuries and 105 half-centuries. Virat is ranked seventh on the list of all-time highest run-scorers in T20 international, league, and domestic cricket.

As soon as Kohli scores 29 runs in the match against SRH, he will reach 13,572 runs in T20. With this, he will surpass Shoaib Malik, who scored 13,571 runs in 515 innings of 557 matches between 2005 and 2025, thanks to 83 half-centuries, and will move to sixth place on the list of all-time highest run-scorers in T20.

Chris Gayle tops the list of all-time highest run-scorers in T20 cricket with a total of 14,562 runs. Following this, Kieron Pollard is second (14,482 runs), Alex Hales is third (14,449 runs), David Warner is fourth (14,028), and Jos Buttler is fifth.

It should be noted that Chris Gayle has retired. Furthermore, the top four players are still active in T20 cricket. Virat Kohli has also retired from international T20 cricket and plays only in the IPL. Given his IPL performance, it's certain that he could become the top scorer in the T20 format by the end of his career.