Ahead of IPL 2025, the BCCI organised a felicitation ceremony for players who had featured in all the 18 seasons of the tournament till that point. Rohit Sharma, MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli received special mementos. Manish Pandey, though, was left out.
The poignancy was hard to miss.
The first Indian to score an IPL century, in 2009. Player of the Match in an IPL final, in 2014, producing one of the great innings chasing in a title clash. Two IPL titles, in 2014 and 2024. But, as the popular aphorism goes: out of sight, out of mind.
With a growing pool of talented Indian batters lifting the ceiling on T20 batting, Pandey had become a back-up for a back-up. Or, at best, an insurance against a collapse in the impact player era. Across 2024 and 2025, he played only four games.
However, when Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) needed a replacement for the out-of-form Ramandeep Singh in IPL 2026 at the start of May, they turned to Pandey, the man who has always possessed something of a magic touch when with KKR.
But KKR produced a streak of five wins across six games - before Wednesday's match against Mumbai Indians (MI) - and became so dominant that Pandey did not get a chance to bat. Coming into Wednesday, his first four entries this season in the scorer's book read DNB, DNB, DNB, DNB.
Pandey, though, contributed with his electric fielding.
There was the stunning one-handed catch at point to dismiss Tim David. The difficult running catch - turned into a regulation one - to remove Nishant Sindhu. The constant boundary prevention inside the circle.
On Wednesday night, he added another - a cool grab off a ball swirling as it came down from the night sky to remove MI's highest scorer of the season, Ryan Rickelton.
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The MI innings on Wednesday had overflown with narratives.
Sunil Narine bowled a #GOAT spell, producing figures of 1 for 13 with a ridiculous 15 dots. A limping Varun Chakravarthy bowled despite feeling the after-effects of a hairline fracture on his toe. Saurabh Dubey justified his selection and Cameron Green stepped it up, both picking up two wickets each in the powerplay.
With only 148 to chase, there was every chance Pandey would be left wearing his pads without using them for a fifth innings in a row.
But KKR lost Finn Allen, their second-most prolific batter of the season, early. Angkrish Raghuvanshi, their most prolific batter and the usual No. 3, was out with a concussion. So Pandey walked out at No. 3. Soon, with Ajinkya Rahane and Green gone, KKR were 54 for 3, and their grasp on the must-win fixture was sliding.
Pandey, though, stabilised the innings, coolly top-scoring with a 33-ball 45.
Maybe it was nostalgia of a man who would regularly shape IPL chases, or perhaps, it was the manner in which he got on top of every MI bowler, but he did enough to edge Narine's spell for the Player-of-the-Match award.
"KKR has been really nice and kind to me," Pandey said while collecting the trophy. "This is the only game I've actually batted [in this season], so I've been padded up and waiting to bat but didn't get the opportunity the first four games. This was a special one. I wanted to stay there, make our team win, and that's what happened."
When Pandey faced his first ball, it was the first ball he had faced in T20 cricket since May 2025. That his first four balls were all dots was understandable. But then came the release shot. A gorgeous on-drive off Jasprit Bumrah that instantly brought back memories of the younger Pandey.
The ease and class with which he dispatched Bumrah served as a reminder that Pandey has been among the best batters against Bumrah in IPL history. Coming into this game, the equation read 80 runs in 42 balls for zero dismissals, and Pandey was only adding to that. Soon, he was lofting Deepak Chahar over his head too.
Against Hardik Pandya, he first hammered one down the ground, before making room for the next ball and cutting through point. He manipulated spinner Raghu Sharma smartly too. Pandey eventually finished with only seven dots - remember, four of them were of his first four balls - relying on his old principles of running hard, building a partnership (with Rovman Powell, of 64 runs) and pacing the chase.
Eventually, it took a Bumrah special to dismiss him: the 15-over-old ball jagged sharply back through the gate. But there was a beautiful coincidence at that moment, as he walked off to a dugout standing in applause. Because of the rain delay, by the time Pandey was dismissed, the date had ticked over to May 21 - the anniversary of his iconic IPL century from 2009.
KKR won with seven balls to spare.
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When Pandey's name was missing in the 18-year celebrations last season, it must have hurt. But he did not make a noise about it. That's how Pandey has always been: soft-spoken and stoic. Type pretty much any cricketer's name on YouTube and you will find an appearance on a podcast, but Pandey has none.
Today, Pandey barely plays top-level cricket. He has been dropped from Karnataka's squad and only plays for Mysuru Warriors in the Maharaja T20 tournament. With limited opportunities in the IPL because of the expanding pool of dynamic, young Indian batters and no realistic chance of an India comeback, Pandey could have long moved into the world of legends' cricket, but he has stayed on.
At 36, he just wants to do two things: "help around younger players who want to ask" him anything, and keep fielding well.
"It doesn't matter, if it's raining or it's a sunny day, [I train on my fielding]," Pandey said, holding his match award. "Because I don't bowl [I want to contribute in some manner]. I enjoy fielding, and I want to contribute even from a single-saving point of view, or by taking brilliant catches. So that's been my forte - I'd like to contribute that way, and I want all the cricket balls to come to me when I'm fielding.
"It gives me great pride to add value to the team in any sense I can. And that's what keeps me going."
It's that attitude, KKR assistant coach Shane Watson said, that makes "you give anything to be able to have them in your squad".
"It's an absolute pleasure to be able to have Manish Pandey with us here in KKR. For me, from a coaching perspective and to work with him - I've worked with him previously at the Delhi Capitals for a couple of seasons - and seeing him throughout the season, this is the best I've seen him bat over the last few years," Watson said after the match. "The positions that he's getting into, the freedom with how he's playing. He's been batting so beautifully. Unfortunately, the situations in the game haven't really given him an opportunity to get out in the middle. So, having an opportunity to bat at three today showed how well he's batting.
"He adds so much value to the team. He's a super experienced guy. He's an amazing fielder. He adds so much energy to our group, whether it's off the field, on the field, around the group. That's the type of person he is. Those types of people, you give anything to be able to have them in your squad, let alone them out in the middle when we're chasing a challenging total on that pitch.
"He really is something else. It seems the way he's looking after himself, his preparation coming into this tournament as well, shows that he's still got a number of years of really good cricket in front of him."
Wednesday night's innings will not rank among the greatest of Pandey's career - the numbers are too modest for that. But this was never about greatness. It was about endurance, grace, and an old hero finding one more night under the lights. In a tournament constantly chasing the future, this was a gentle reminder not to forget the players who shaped its past.