Delhi Capitals

The Delhi Capitals is one of four IPL teams that are still dreaming of winning the league. This season, the club decided to make a few drastic changes and try to attack the trophy with new strengths. Some of their main advantages are the following:

Any IPL club has certain weaknesses that make them vulnerable on the field. Delhi Capitals aren’t immune as they too feature a few disadvantages. Here are the ones worth mentioning:

This team has plenty of players to count on for the IPL 2025 season. However, there are several cricketers who are leading the way. Those are Faf du Plessis, Jake Fraser-McGurk, KL Rahul, Mukesh Kumar, Mitchell Starc, Axar Patel, and T. Natarajan.

Historical Performance

The Delhi Capitals formed in 2008 and was one of the main teams in the first IPL season. Since then, it has managed to play in all 17 league editions. But, sadly it failed to win a trophy so far.

Fans can spectate their home matches at the Arun Jaitley Cricket Stadium in New Delhi. It’s a field that can hold a total of 35,200 visitors. However, this team also uses the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh International Cricket Stadium in Raipur as their second home. This arena can accommodate up to 65,000 individuals.

In its long history, Delhi Capitals managed to appear in 6 playoffs, which is nearly a third of all IPL seasons. They’ve also appeared in only one final in 2020, which they lost to Mumbai Indians.

In terms of player records, Rishabh Pant is the batter with the most runs scored for the team. He managed to accumulate a total of 3,284 runs in 7 seasons with the Delhi Capitals. As for wickets, Amit Mishra is the all-time leader with 110 wickets in 14 years with the club.

Delhi Capitals in Recent Seasons

In the past 5 IPL seasons, Delhi Capitals had mostly negative experiences. Their best one was in 2020, where they ended the group stage in 2nd place. After that, the team failed to beat Mumbai Indians in the quarter finals. But, they were better against Sunrisers Hyderabad in the semi-finals.

The Capitals met the Indians one more time in the final, but they ended up losing again by 5 wickets. Sadly for them, this was their only IPL final in their lifetime.

This team started the 2021 IPL season even stronger as they finished the first phase in 1st place. They’ve accumulated 20 points after winning 10 out of 14 matches. But, they didn’t perform as expected during the playoffs. The Capitals lost the quarter-finals to the Super Kings and the semi-finals to the Knight Riders.

Following these two somewhat good seasons, the team entered a declining phase. During the 2022 IPL season, they managed to get 14 points and finish in 5th position. They only needed 2 more points to equal the Royal Challengers in 4th place and possibly qualify for the playoffs.

The next year was even worse for the Capitals. They finished the season in 9th place with only 5 wins and 10 points. This team even had a negative net run rate of -0.808.

Last season, Delhi Capitals once again failed to book a place in the quarter-finals. They finished the group stage as 6th with 7 wins, 7 losses, and 14 points. The Royal Challengers ended in 4th place with the same number of points, but with a much better net run rate.

Delhi Capitals Players 2025

The Delhi Capitals squad 2025 features a total of 23 players with a nice mix in every position. For this IPL edition, the club chose to retain 7 and acquire 16 new cricketers. At this stage, we’ll present every single one of them.

Batters

This team will attack the 2025 IPL title with 6 main batters, including 2 retained players. This selection holds 3 domestic and 3 overseas cricketers, which combine different experiences and styles. Here are the featured batters that will represent the Capitals this year:

• Jake Fraser-McGurk – An Australian right-handed batter who’s ready to start his second season with the Capitals. Last year, he scored 330 runs in 9 matches and now he’s ready to get even better stats and possibly win the league.
• Harry Brook – This is a right-handed English batter who has also been at the club since 2024. But, sadly for him, he didn’t get a single appearance last year due to certain personal matters. Hopefully, he’ll show what he got this season.
• Karun Nair – A newly-signed right-handed batter who hasn’t played a single IPL match since 2020. Still, Delhi Capitals will use him as a backup as he’s proven his abilities before.
• Faf du Plessis – One of the best batters of all time who has 2 IPL titles to his name. His league stats include 4,571 runs in 145 matches and an average of 35.99.
• Sameer Rizvi – The Capitals acquired this right-handed batter as one of their backup players. He previously played for Chennai Super Kings where he made 8 appearances and scored 51 runs.
• Ashutosh Sharma – Another new right-handed batter who joined the Capitals from Punjab Kings. He made 11 appearances last season where he scored 189 runs. Sharma will be one of the few backup batters this season.

Wicket-Keepers

For the wicket-keeper position, the club decided to input 4 players. Among them are 2 retained and 2 new cricketers who can provide different approaches on the field. You can read all about them below this segment.

• KL Rahul – A well-known right-handed wicket-keeper who has a lot of experience in the IPL and plenty to show on the field. In his long career, Rahul managed to score 4,683 runs in 132 matches.
• Tristan Stubbs – This is a South African right-handed wicket-keeper who’ll go head-to-head with Rahul. 2025 will be his second IPL season after playing 14 matches last year and getting 378 runs.
• Donovan Ferreira – A 26-year-old South African wicket-keeper who joined the Capitals from Rajasthan Royals. However, this player has little experience in the IPL as he played only 2 matches so far.
• Abhishek Porel – This is the only left-handed wicket-keeper who’s been part of the team since 2023. He’s slowly becoming a standard player as last year, he played all 14 matches, scoring 327 runs.

All-Rounders

There is only one past all-rounder who will represent Delhi Capitals in the 2025 IPL season. Alongside him are 6 new cricketers who can help with batting and bowling. The current all-rounders who are playing for this team are the following.

• Axar Patel – A 31-year-old all-rounder who plays as a left-handed batter and slow left-arm orthodox bowler. He’s been part of the Capitals since 2019 and so far he has scored 969 runs and 62 wickets.
• Darshan Nalkande – This is a new all-rounder who prefers a right-handed batting and right-arm medium-fast bowling style. While playing for Rajasthan Royals, he scored 12 runs and 6 wickets in 6 matches.
• Madhav Tiwari – A young all-rounder with no IPL appearances who just signed for Delhi Capitals. He plays as a right-handed batter and right-arm medium-fast bowler. The team will surely use him as a backup player.
• Vipraj Nigam – Another newly-acquired and inexperienced all-rounder who is looking for his first IPL matches. He can help the Delhi Capitals as a right-handed batter and right-arm leg-break bowler.
• Tripurana Vijay – The Capitals signed this 23-year-old as an additional all-rounder for the upcoming season, despite the lack of playing time. Vijay can perform as a right-handed batter and a right-arm off-break bowler.
• L Manvanth Kumar – A 21-year-old hot prospect who can play as a right-handed batter and right-arm medium-fast bowler. He too searches for his first IPL match and hopes to get it this year.
• Ajay Mandal – This is a 28-year-old all-rounder with zero IPL matches who signed for the Capitals after leaving Chennai Super Kings. Mandal prefers a left-handed batting and slow left-arm orthodox bowling style.

Bowlers

As part of the Delhi Capitals, players 2025 are a total of 6 bowlers who mostly prefer pace over spin bowling. This group of players features 2 retained and 4 new cricketers. The bowlers who will play for the Capitals this season are the following:

• Kuldeep Yadav – A left-arm wrist-spin bowler who has played for the Capitals since 2022. In his 3 seasons with the club, he achieved 47 wickets in 39 matches. Now, he’s ready to pump up those numbers even further.
• Mitchell Starc – An Australian left-arm fast bowler who many consider as one of the best in his position. He has a lot of experience in the sport but only managed to play 3 seasons in the IPL.
• T. Natarajan – This is the team’s new left-arm medium-pace bowler who’ll be a great addition to the squad. In his IPL career, he accumulated 67 wickets in 61 matches.
• Mohit Sharma – A 36-year-old right-arm medium-fast bowler who previously played for the Capitals in 2020. In his long IPL career, this player performed 132 wickets in 112 appearances.
• Mukesh Kumar – The Capitals decided to retain this right-arm medium-fast bowler as he’s a pretty good rotation player. During his 2 years at the club, Kumar played 20 matches and achieved 24 wickets.
• Dushmantha Chameera – A 33-year-old right-arm fast bowler who joined the team after winning the 2024 IPL with Kolkata. The Capitals will use him as a backup as he lacks experience in this highly demanding league.

Delhi Capitals Captain

Fans and media also see Axar Patel as a possible candidate for the captaincy. He’s the longest-serving Delhi Capitals player with 6 seasons behind him. Patel is also a key player who is capable of performing even in the toughest matches.

All of these 3 candidates are capable of leading a top team such as Delhi Capitals. Let’s see which one of them will be the club’s captain for the 2025 IPL season.

Delhi Capitals Rivals

Delhi Capitals doesn’t have a true fierce rivalry with any IPL team. However, this club does see 3 other sides as their main competitors. One of them is Mumbai Indians, which they met in 35 events. The records show that the Indians have managed to get 3 more wins compared to the Capitals.

The Capitals’ fans started disliking Mumbai Indians after they suffered a loss in the 2020 quarter-finals and final. They even lost their quarter-finals against them the previous season.

Some supporters also see Chennai Super Kings as a rival. This sense of competitiveness first appeared in the 2012 IPL playoffs where the Capitals lost the qualifying finals to the Super Kings. The latter team also beat Delhi in the 2019 semi-finals and 2021 quarter-finals.

Head-to-head, the Capitals have 11 wins while the Super Kings have 19 victories. It’s worth pointing out that the Indians and the Super Kings have 5 IPL titles each while the Capitals have zero.

Another IPL team that we can consider as a rival to Delhi Capitals is Kolkata Knight Riders. Both clubs met at the 2012 and 2021 semi-finals and Kolkata won twice. They also feature 18 victories while the Capitals only have 15.