Under the captaincy of Shreyas Iyer, Kolkata Knight Riders secured their first victory in IPL 2026 on Sunday. While chasing a target of 156 runs set by Rajasthan Royals, KKR’s start was extremely poor, and the team lost 6 wickets by the time they reached 85 runs. The opening pair flopped completely in this match, where both Ajinkya Rahane and Tim Seifert failed to open their accounts.
However, in the middle overs, Rinku Singh changed the course of the match by playing a brilliant half-century innings, pulling the team out of difficult circumstances and leading them to victory. But despite this win, an unwanted record was attached to Ajinkya Rahane’s name.
In fact, Rahane has now become the player with the most ducks as an opener in IPL history. This was the 12th duck of his career. Previously, he had equaled Parthiv Patel in this regard, who was out for zero 11 times as an opener. Consistent poor starts have raised serious questions about his performance.
Some players have had a very poor record regarding getting out for a duck as an opener in the IPL. Ajinkya Rahane’s name comes at the top of this list, having returned to the pavilion 12 times without opening his account so far.
Following him is Parthiv Patel, who has been out for zero 11 times. In third place are Shikhar Dhawan and Gautam Gambhir, both of whom have fallen victim to a duck 10 times each. Meanwhile, David Warner is also included in this list, having been out 9 times as an opener without scoring a run.
Thus, these statistics show that even some big names have faced poor starts multiple times while opening in the IPL.
Ajinkya Rahane’s performance in IPL 2026 has been mixed. In the very first match of the season, he batted brilliantly and scored 67 runs, but despite this, his team had to face defeat.
After this, his form continued to decline in the next 6 innings. In 4 of these, he could not even touch double digits, and in one match, he was out without opening his account. Prior to this, he had also returned to the pavilion for zero in the match against Gujarat.
So far in the 7 matches played this season, Rahane has scored a total of 152 runs. However, due to consistently unstable performance, his form remains a matter of concern for the team.
