April The season began on 3 April with the defending champions the
Kolkata Knight Riders defeating the
Delhi Daredevils; Kolkata and Australian quick
Brett Lee notably getting a wicket off the first ball of the tournament, getting
Unmukt Chand out. Kolkata would then struggle and lose five of their next six matches due to good batting performances only coming from captain
Gautam Gambhir and
Eoin Morgan. Delhi, who topped the group stage in 2012, had a six-match losing streak due to batting failures apart from three half-centuries from captain
Mahela Jayawardene and
David Warner. Both Delhi and Kolkata were positioned at the bottom of the points table for the first half of the season. Three-time runners-up the
Royal Challengers Bangalore won six of their first eight matches with a six-of-six home record. This was credited to good death-over bowling from
Vinay Kumar and prolific and quick run-scoring from captain
Virat Kohli,
Chris Gayle and
AB de Villiers. This included Gayle's score of 175 not out, the highest in Twenty20 cricket. However, their performances were fluctuant. Included was a 130-run victory, two
Super Overs and two other matches involving a tight finish. Two-time champions the
Chennai Super Kings were similarly dominant, with good batting from captain
Mahendra Singh Dhoni,
Michael Hussey and
Suresh Raina and an all-round bowling attack. They came up with an IPL record-equalling seven-match winning streak, which took them to the top of the points table. The
Mumbai Indians, who made playoff-stage appearances in each of the past three years, were inconsistent with both batting and bowling. Good batting performances from
Dinesh Karthik,
Rohit Sharma and
Kieron Pollard put Mumbai at the middle of the points table halfway through the season. The
Sunrisers Hyderabad produced results contrary to the poor performance last season by their predecessors the
Deccan Chargers. With no stand-out individual batting performances, Hyderabad managed to win five of their first seven matches. Their strength was in their strong and economical bowling from an attack centred around
Dale Steyn and
Amit Mishra. Mishra got the second
hat-trick of the season, becoming the first to achieve three IPL hat-tricks. Also at the middle of the points table was the
Rajasthan Royals. They won matches with cohesive batting and bowling where different players delivered match-winning contributions.
Shane Watson produced scores of 101 and 98 not out while
James Faulkner was briefly the season's top wicket-taker after taking 5 for 20. The
Pune Warriors India and the
Kings XI Punjab continue their form from 2012. Pune won two matches from eight with significant contributions coming only from
Aaron Finch,
Steve Smith and
Bhuvneshwar Kumar. Punjab had average performances with poor contributions from their international players and a dependency on their less-accomplished local players.
May In the second half of the season, Chennai continued to be dominant and held their number-one position on the points table while Mumbai, Rajasthan, Bangalore and Hyderabad were evenly matched as they switched between the positions of second to fifth. Mumbai excelled to win seven out of eight matches with improved bowling performances around
Mitchell Johnson and Pollard producing an unbeaten innings of 66 runs from 27 balls. Rajasthan were also strong and had four consecutive victories and a perfect record at home.
Ajinkya Rahane scored three consecutive half-centuries,
Sanju Samson made a strong IPL debut and Watson continued his good form. Bangalore's schedule had them play six consecutive away matches, of which they could only win two due to their bowling attack struggling on away surfaces and repeatedly failures to defend high scores set by Gayle, Kohli and de Villiers. Hyderabad's bowlers continued to perform while their batting was strengthened with the inclusion of
Shikhar Dhawan, who returned from injury after scoring the
fastest Test-debut hundred two months ago, and
Darren Sammy. Bangalore and Hyderabad slowly fell behind Mumbai and Rajasthan in the points table, allowing a chance for other teams. Delhi and Pune failed to recover from their poor starts to the season and were the first to be eliminated from the tournament, similar to their performances in
2011. Punjab's form deteriorated as they faced teams at the top-half of the points table, with only
Shaun Marsh and
David Miller making significant batting contributions. Kolkata showed signs of improvement as their bowlers limited the opposition to low scores but this only lifted their position to sixth. Both Punjab and Kolkata needed to win every one of their remaining matches for any chance of qualification. With ten matches remaining in the group stage, Chennai, Mumbai and Rajasthan were first to earn playoff stage berths while a few losses by Bangalore and Hyderabad gave Kolkata and Punjab a slim chance of competing for the final spot. Kolkata was eliminated after suffering an upset at home by Pune. Punjab, despite finishing their season with three straight wins, failed to catch up. The tie between Bangalore and Hyderabad came down to the final match of the group stage, between Hyderabad and Kolkata. Hyderabad won to place themselves narrowly ahead of Bangalore by one win and qualify.
Playoff stage Amidst the spot-fixing controversy and despite Faulkner's second
five-wicket haul, Rajasthan finished the group stage with two consecutive losses and gave Mumbai and Chennai the advantageous top two positions. Rajasthan faced Hyderabad in the
Eliminator. On a slow pitch that troubled batsmen,
Brad Hodge top-scored with an unbeaten innings of 54 runs to help Rajasthan win in a low-scoring match. In
Qualifier 2, Mumbai defeated Rajasthan by 4 wickets. Mumbai bowled better, as
Harbhajan Singh's 3 wickets earned him the
man of the match. Smith was again the top-scorer for Mumbai, scoring 68 but better support from other batsmen allowed Mumbai to win with one ball remaining. Mumbai faced Chennai in the
Final, in which the Mumbai Indians had a shaky start but due to some great batting by Kieron Pollard (he scored 60*), they managed to reach a score of 148–9. They started well with the ball, reducing Chennai to 39–6, but captain
MS Dhoni led from the front. However, he lacked support from the other end. Finally they finished at 125–9, giving the
Mumbai Indians an unexpected victory and won their first IPL Title. ==Other incidents==