Total worth generated across the campaign came to ₹135.21 crore against a total cost base of ₹107.92 crore.
Prabhsimran Singh, bought for ₹4 crore, generated a worth of ₹19.90 crore across 14 appearances, for a profit of ₹15.90 crore.
Yuzvendra Chahal, at ₹18 crore, generated ₹3.73 crore in worth across 13 appearances.
Arshdeep Singh, also at ₹18 crore, generated ₹5.07 crore in worth across 14 appearances.
The two of them together cost ₹36 crore, returned ₹8.80 crore, and destroyed ₹27.20 crore of value.
Punjab Kings entered IPL 2026 as last year's finalists and exited the league stage in fifth place with 15 points, one short of the playoff cut. The cricket story of six consecutive wins followed by six consecutive defeats has been told at length. What has not been told is the financial story underneath it, which is starker, more precise, and considerably more damning. The WPA Impact Index assigns a monetary value to every player's appearance across the season, and for PBKS, it reveals a squad built on a structural contradiction that no winning streak could permanently hide. Shreyas Iyer led the Punjab Kings for the second season. (PTI) The top line and what sits beneath it PBKS finished with a season profit of ₹27.29 crore, placing sixth in the ten-team monetary league table. Total worth generated across the campaign came to ₹135.21 crore against a total cost base of ₹107.92 crore. On the surface, that is a franchise operating in the black with a reasonable margin. The surface reading is misleading. PBKS carried the third-highest cost base in the competition, behind only the Mumbai Indians ( ₹112.59 crore) and the Delhi Capitals ( ₹108.57 crore). Teams ranked first through fifth spent between ₹85.80 crore and ₹97.48 crore, comfortably below PBKS's outlay. The season's best commercial performer in the league stage, Sunrisers Hyderabad, have generated a profit of ₹69.46 crore on a cost of ₹87.41 crore. PBKS generated ₹27.29 crore on an investment of ₹107.92 crore. That is not a comparable outcome. The base impact profit-and-loss figure tells the real story. Stripped of rating adjustments and captaincy credits, PBKS's raw cricket value relative to cost results in a deficit of ₹36.45 crore. The ₹27.29 crore headline profit exists because ₹11.72 crore of captaincy premium and positive rating adjustments sit atop a base that is deeply underwater. PBKS are a profitable franchise in the ledger because of subjective quality recognition, not because their auction investments generated commensurate on-field returns. Where the value came from The squad's commercial engine was almost entirely located at the top of the batting order, among its three cheapest significant contributors. Prabhsimran Singh, bought for ₹4 crore, generated a worth of ₹19.90 crore across 14 appearances, for a profit of ₹15.90 crore. Cooper Connolly, at ₹3 crore, produced a value of ₹17.39 crore on ₹14.39 crore in profit. Priyansh Arya, at ₹3.80 crore, returned ₹14.06 crore for ₹10.26 crore in profit. Combined cost for these three: ₹10.80 crore. Combined worth: ₹51.35 crore. Combined surplus: ₹40.55 crore.
Punjab Kings balance sheet for IPL 2026. (HT Digital)
The single best value ratio in the squad belongs to Suryansh Shedge. Purchased for ₹30 lakh, he produced ₹5.91 crore in worth across seven appearances, a surplus of ₹5.61 crore on a negligible investment. His season recovery percentage is the kind of number that makes auction strategy teams recalibrate their models. Shreyas Iyer, the captain, is the player the raw numbers alone cannot fully capture. At ₹26.75 crore he is the most expensive player in the squad, and a player P&L of ₹2.65 crore looks modest at first glance. But the WPA Impact Index credits him with ₹11.72 crore in captaincy value across the season, a figure that reflects something the batting scorecard does not show: the structural role he played in holding a young, inexperienced top order together through a gruelling 14-match campaign. His total P&L, including captaincy premium, reaches a figure that justifies the investment more comfortably. Add to that his match-winning hundred against LSG in the final league game, the innings that kept PBKS's playoff hopes alive to the last day, and Iyer's season reads less like an expensive underperformance and more like the cost of having an anchor at the top when everything else around the bowling unit was coming apart. Also Read: INR 34.21 crore profit despite premium disappointments: KKR's IPL 2026 balance sheet reveals their real saviours Where the value was destroyed Two rows in the player ledger account for the team's base-level deficit almost in their entirety. Yuzvendra Chahal, at ₹18 crore, generated ₹3.73 crore in worth across 13 appearances. Profit and loss: minus ₹14.27 crore. Arshdeep Singh, also at ₹18 crore, generated ₹5.07 crore in worth across 14 appearances. Profit and loss: minus ₹12.93 crore. The two of them together cost ₹36 crore, returned ₹8.80 crore, and destroyed ₹27.20 crore of value. That figure represents two-thirds of the entire top-order batting surplus.
The PBKS team value waterfall. (HT Digital)
