The International League T20 has built its identity around fearless batting, and nowhere is that clearer than in its six-hitting numbers. Four seasons in, one name sits well clear of the chasing pack, while several others have quietly built totals that tell their own story about role, team, and opportunity.
This article breaks down who has actually hit the most sixes in ILT20 history, how the season-by-season six-hitting titles have been shared around, and why raw totals alone don’t tell you everything about a player’s power-hitting. All figures below are current through the completed 2025-26 season, which ended in January 2026, with Desert Vipers as champions.
Who Has Hit the Most Sixes in ILT20?
Nicholas Pooran of MI Emirates is the all-time leading six-hitter in ILT20 history, with 84 sixes across four seasons. He has held this record since the league’s early years and has extended his lead every season he’s played. Muhammad Waseem (68) and Kieron Pollard (58), both also of MI Emirates, sit second and third.
ILT20 All-Time Most Sixes: Career Leaderboard
| Rank | Player | Team(s) | Sixes | Innings | Balls per Six (approx.) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nicholas Pooran | MI Emirates | 84 | 39 | ~7.9 |
| 2 | Muhammad Waseem | MI Emirates | 68 | 46 | ~9.9 |
| 3 | Kieron Pollard | MI Emirates | 58 | 29 | ~7.6 |
| 4 | Rovman Powell | Dubai Capitals | 53 | 38 | ~9.4 |
| 5 | Tom Kohler-Cadmore | Sharjah Warriorz | 52 | 37 | ~10.3 |
| 6 | Johnson Charles | Sharjah Warriorz | 46 | 30 | ~8.7 |
| 7 | Tom Banton | Dubai Capitals, Gulf Giants, MI Emirates | 38 | 35 | ~13.4 |
| 8 | Sikandar Raza | Dubai Capitals, Sharjah Warriorz | 33 | 38 | ~11.7 |
Balls-per-six figures are approximate, calculated from published runs, strike rate, and six totals; treat them as indicative rather than officially published numbers. Alex Hales and James Vince, the tournament’s top two run-scorers, have not had their exact ILT20 six-hitting totals published in the same detail as the players above, so they are left out of this specific table rather than guessed at.
It’s worth pointing out what this table doesn’t include: Hales (1,405 career runs, the most in ILT20 history) and Vince (1,239 runs) are both prolific boundary-hitters who lean more on fours and running between the wickets than pure six-hitting. That’s a genuine stylistic difference worth knowing if you’re comparing “best batter” lists against “biggest six-hitter” lists, because they aren’t the same question.
Why Nicholas Pooran Leads the Six-Hitting Charts
Pooran’s position at the top isn’t an accident of longevity. He has fewer career innings (39) than both Waseem (46) and Hales (46), yet comfortably the most sixes. That efficiency lines up with his broader T20 reputation: in the 2024 calendar year, Pooran hit 139 sixes across all T20 cricket, breaking Chris Gayle’s long-standing single-year record, and 31 of those came in ILT20 2024 alone, which was also the most sixes by anyone in that specific season.
His batting position helps explain the numbers too. Pooran typically comes in through the middle order for MI Emirates, a role that puts him in position to target the back end of an innings against tiring bowlers, rather than opening and having to see off the new ball.
His left-handed method and ability to clear the ropes against both pace and spin, documented extensively in his 2024 six-hitting data, translates directly into an ILT20 record that has grown every season he’s featured.
Waseem and Pollard’s presence right behind him is a reminder that MI Emirates, the league’s first champions from a batting-power perspective if not from a title perspective in every season, have built their top order around players who don’t need long stays at the crease to make an impact. MI Emirates won the title in 2024, and this six-hitting depth was central to that.
Season-by-Season: ILT20’s Six-Hitting Leaders
Because ILT20 has only completed four seasons, it’s just as useful to look at who topped the six-hitting charts in each individual edition. This shows how much variation there’s been from year to year, and it hasn’t always been the same names.
| Season | Leading Six-Hitter | Team | Sixes | Champion |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | Kieron Pollard | MI Emirates | 29 | Gulf Giants |
| 2024 | Nicholas Pooran | MI Emirates | 31 | MI Emirates |
| 2025 | Johnson Charles | Sharjah Warriorz | 25 | Dubai Capitals |
| 2025-26 | Rahmanullah Gurbaz | Gulf Giants | 20 | Desert Vipers |
A couple of things stand out here. First, no player has repeated as the season’s top six-hitter, which says something about how competitive and unpredictable ILT20’s batting landscape has been compared to some other leagues where one or two power-hitters dominate year after year.
Second, the season six totals have actually trended downward, from Pollard’s 29 in the inaugural year to Gurbaz’s 20 in the most recent edition. That’s likely tied to conditions and bowling depth improving across the league rather than any decline in batting quality; teams have brought in sharper death bowlers and more varied spin options each year, which naturally trims down the biggest hitting totals.
Rahmanullah Gurbaz’s emergence as the 2025-26 season leader is also notable because he’s not part of the all-time top eight in career sixes. That’s a sign of a genuinely new face pushing into the six-hitting conversation, and worth watching heading into ILT20’s fifth season, expected to begin around November 2026.
The Other Big Hitters Worth Knowing
Muhammad Waseem is the highest-ranked UAE-born player on both the runs and sixes lists, and his 68 sixes have come while opening the innings for MI Emirates in every one of his 46 ILT20 innings. That’s a different challenge to the middle-order six-hitting of Pooran or Pollard, since openers face the new ball and tighter fields inside the powerplay.
Rovman Powell built his 53 sixes largely at No. 5 for Dubai Capitals, a role suited to attacking straight from the middle overs onward. He was Player of the Match in the 2025 final as Dubai Capitals won their first title, and his six-hitting was a big part of why Dubai Capitals’ middle order held up under pressure that season.
Tom Kohler-Cadmore has been Sharjah Warriorz’s most consistent six-hitter across three seasons with the franchise, and Sharjah’s small boundaries have suited his method of hitting straight and over midwicket.
Johnson Charles, the 2025 season’s top six-hitter, plays a similar top-order role for Sharjah Warriorz and is one of only two players (alongside Waseem) in the top eight who has spent his entire ILT20 career with a single team.
What These Numbers Actually Tell Us
A raw six count on its own can be a little misleading if you don’t factor in innings played. Pooran’s 84 sixes in 39 innings is a materially different achievement to, say, a similar total spread across 55 or 60 innings.
That’s why the balls-per-six estimates in the leaderboard table matter as much as the headline number: Pollard and Pooran both convert deliveries into sixes faster than anyone else in the top eight, while Banton and Raza, despite solid six counts, get there over a longer stretch of balls faced because more of their scoring comes through running and boundaries along the ground.
It’s also worth remembering that ILT20 sits inside a much bigger picture of modern T20 six-hitting. Pooran’s own season-best of 31 sixes in ILT20 2024 was only his third-biggest tournament haul that calendar year, behind his 36 sixes in IPL 2024.
Andre Russell and Kieron Pollard, two of the most destructive six-hitters in T20 history worldwide, have each spent time in the ILT20 without necessarily topping its six-hitting charts, since their appearances have been shorter or their national-team and IPL commitments have limited how many ILT20 innings they’ve actually played.
How ILT20 Compares to Other T20 Leagues for Six-Hitting
At four seasons old, ILT20’s all-time totals are naturally smaller than the IPL’s, where Chris Gayle alone has hit 357 career sixes across more than a decade of cricket. That’s simply a function of ILT20 having played roughly 136 total matches across four seasons compared to the IPL’s much longer history.
The more useful comparison is rate rather than raw totals, and there Pooran’s efficiency (sixes roughly every eight balls faced) compares favourably with the top end of six-hitting anywhere in franchise cricket.
Sharjah’s reputation for short boundaries also shows up clearly in the data, with both Kohler-Cadmore and Charles building large shares of their totals there. Dubai and Abu Dhabi’s larger grounds tend to reward more placement-based batting, which is part of why some of the league’s best run-scorers, like Hales and Vince, don’t necessarily lead the six-hitting charts despite their run totals.
FAQs
Who has hit the most sixes in ILT20 history?
Nicholas Pooran leads with 84 career sixes for MI Emirates, ahead of Muhammad Waseem (68) and Kieron Pollard (58), as of the end of the 2025-26 season.
Who hit the most sixes in a single ILT20 season?
Nicholas Pooran holds the single-season record with 31 sixes in ILT20 2024. Kieron Pollard (29 in 2023), Johnson Charles (25 in 2025), and Rahmanullah Gurbaz (20 in 2025-26) have topped the other three seasons.
Which team has produced the most ILT20 six-hitters?
MI Emirates, with Pooran, Waseem, and Pollard occupying three of the top three spots on the all-time list. That six-hitting depth was a major factor in their 2024 title win.
Final Word
ILT20’s six-hitting story is still being written, but the shape of it so far is clear. Nicholas Pooran’s record is built on genuine efficiency rather than sheer volume of innings, and it’s backed up by the same six-hitting reputation he’s built across world cricket. What’s more interesting for the league’s future is how spread out the season-by-season leadership has been.
Four different players have topped four different seasons, which suggests ILT20’s six-hitting race is nowhere near settled, and the fifth season could easily produce a new name at the top of an individual year’s chart even if Pooran’s all-time record stands for a while longer.
