While most countries have their own T20 franchise league, one of the biggest leagues in the world has to be the Indian Premier League (IPL) which began in 2008 and has slowly but steadily grown into one of the most popular cricketing events on the annual calendar. Over the years, records have come and gone but here, we’re going to talk about one major bowling achievement called the IPL Purple Cap.
What is the IPL Purple Cap?
Every year, the IPL felicitates the best batsman and best bowler of the season, with the best bowler being presented with an award called the Purple Cap. The cap changes heads as the tournament progresses and eventually, the bowler with the most wickets at the end of an IPL season wins the Purple Cap award. Similarly, there’s an award for the top run scorer and you can read our IPL Orange Cap winners list.
The IPL was the first tournament to introduce such awards for the top bowler and then many other leagues copied the idea and introduced variations of the award. When the IPL began in 2008, it was an overseas bowler in Pakistan’s Sohail Tanvir who won the first ever Purple Cap award. It shows how much Pakistan players have been missed in the IPL as after that year, they were banned from playing the IPL!
SEE ALSO: List of top online sports betting websites
In a total of fifteen completed IPL seasons till date, only seven times has a local Indian bowler gone on to win the Purple Cap award, with eight of them going to the overseas stars (All stats updated 29th April 2023). And that achievement of Tanvir was even better than it looks because he only played 11 games in that season and bagged 22 wickets, playing for the then champions Rajasthan Royals in IPL 2008.
IPL Purple Cap winners list
| Year | Purple Cap winner | Team | Wickets (Matches) | Best spell |
| 2008 | Sohail Tanvir | Rajasthan Royals | 22 (11) | 6/14 |
| 2009 | RP Singh | Deccan Chargers | 23 (16) | 4/22 |
| 2010 | Pragyan Ojha | Deccan Chargers | 21 (16) | 3/26 |
| 2011 | Lasith Malinga | Mumbai Indians | 28 (16) | 5/13 |
| 2012 | Morne Morkel | Delhi Daredevils | 25 (16) | 4/20 |
| 2013 | Dwayne Bravo | Chennai Super Kings | 32 (18) | 4/42 |
| 2014 | Mohit Sharma | Chennai Super Kings | 23 (16) | 4/14 |
| 2015 | Dwayne Bravo (2) | Chennai Super Kings | 26 (17) | 3/22 |
| 2016 | Bhuvneshwar Kumar | Sunrisers Hyderabad | 23 (17) | 4/29 |
| 2017 | Bhuvneshwar Kumar (2) | Sunrisers Hyderabad | 26 (14) | 5/19 |
| 2018 | Andrew Tye | Kings XI Punjab | 24 (14) | 5/17 |
| 2019 | Imran Tahir | Chennai Super Kings | 26 (17) | 4/12 |
| 2020 | Kagiso Rabada | Delhi Capitals | 30 (17) | 4/21 |
| 2021 | Harshal Patel | Royal Challengers Bangalore | 32 (15) | 5/27 |
| 2022 | Yuzvendra Chahal | Rajasthan Royals | 27 (17) | 5/40 |
| 2023 | TBD | TBD | TBD | TBD |
| 2024 | TBD | TBD | TBD | TBD |
You’ll see that not even once in the history of the tournament has someone from Kolkata Knight Riders gone on to win the IPL Purple Cap, even though they’ve played every season till date. On the other hand, the team to have won it the most number of times is Chennai Super Kings (4 Purple Cap awards) including three consecutive times between IPL 2013 to IPL 2015, and once again in IPL 2019.
SEE ALSO: List of best fantasy sports websites in India
Among the individual records, only two bowlers in IPL history have gone on to win the Purple Cap award twice each. One of them is Dwayne Bravo who won it in IPL 2013 and IPL 2015 and is among the leading wicket takers in the IPL; the other is SRH pacer who is also the only player to have won the Purple Cap in two consecutive seasons, doing so between IPL 2016 and IPL 2017 – Bhuvneshwar Kumar.
The lowest number of wickets that a bowler has needed to take in order to win the Purple Cap was 21 wickets by Pragyan Ojha in IPL 2010 while the most number of wickets in a single season is 32 scalps, achieved by Dwayne Bravo in IPL 2013 and also recently by Harshal Patel in IPL 2021. Only thrice have spinners won the Purple Cap – Ojha in IPL 2010, Imran Tahir in IPL 2019, and Yuzvendra Chahal in IPL 2022.
At the time of last updating this page, there was a nice little battle happening on top of the wickets table of IPL 2023, with RCB’s Mohammed Siraj leading with 14 scalps in 8 games so far. For more updates on the Indian Premier League and on personal and team milestones achieved in this tournament over the years, stay tuned to ReadScoops.com…
Register on 10Cric and get a whopping INR 10,000 first deposit bonus
