Axar Patel makes it seven toss wins in a row as Delhi bat first vs Punjab without Mitchell Starc

Delhi Capitals won the toss and elected to bat first against Punjab Kings at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in Delhi in Match 35 of IPL 2026 on Saturday afternoon.

DC vs PBKS: What Axar Patel and Shreyas Iyer at the toss

Axar Patel has now won seven consecutive tosses this season, a remarkable run of luck at the coin that has given him the luxury of always setting the terms of engagement. Today he chose to bat on what he described as a dry surface that he expects to slow down as the day progresses, giving his bowlers the benefit of a deteriorating pitch in the second innings.

Shreyas Iyer admitted before the toss that he wanted to bowl and that the result was effectively inconsequential given both captains wanted the same outcome. Two things of note before we get to the cricket, Mitchell Starc has linked up with the DC squad in Delhi and is targeting the May 1 fixture against Rajasthan Royals for his IPL 2026 debut, while Rehan Ahmed has also officially joined the squad as Ben Duckett's replacement.

DC vs PBKS: Mitchell Starc in Delhi but not playing today

The news DC fans have been waiting months for is almost here but not quite yet. Starc, who was cleared by Cricket Australia earlier this week after recovering from elbow and shoulder injuries sustained during the Australian summer, has arrived in Delhi and is in the building, but today's game comes one match too early for him to feature.

He will use the next week to build up his bowling workload before making what should be a significant return against Rajasthan Royals on May 1. Rehan Ahmed's arrival as Duckett's replacement is also now confirmed, giving Axar additional spin options to call upon from the bench.

DC vs PBKS: Playing XIs And Impact Players

DC: KL Rahul (wk), Pathum Nissanka, Sameer Rizvi, Axar Patel (c), Nitish Rana, Tristan Stubbs, David Miller, Lungi Ngidi, Kuldeep Yadav, T Natarajan, Mukesh Kumar. Impact: Vipraj Nigam, Karun Nair, Dushmantha Chameera, Ashutosh Sharma, Auqib Nabi Dar.

PBKS: Prabhsimran Singh (wk), Priyansh Arya, Cooper Connolly, Shreyas Iyer (c), Shashank Singh, Marcus Stoinis, Marco Jansen, Xavier Bartlett, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Arshdeep Singh, Yuzvendra Chahal. Impact: Nehal Wadhera, Harpreet Brar, Suryansh Shedge, Yash Thakur, Vishnu Vinod.

Also READ: Sai Sudharsan breaks Chris Gayle's iconic IPL record that stood for 13 long years