Saba Karim was also baffled with Rishabh Pant arriving to the crease for just two balls.© BCCI
Lucknow Super Giants’ (LSG) thumping defeat at the hands of Delhi Capitals (DC) in IPL 2025 has led to heavy criticism of captain Rishabh Pant, mainly due to one tactical blunder committed by the team. Pant decided to demote himself to number seven, with the likes of Abdul Samad, Ayush Badoni and David Miller batting ahead of him. The gamble backfired as LSG could only manage 159/6 with Pant getting bowled on the final over of the innings by Mukesh.
Former India selector Saba Karim was also baffled with Pant arriving to the crease with only two balls remaining in the innings.
“Strategy? It’s beyond my understanding. You are the captain. You are handed this responsibility, and the reason for it is that you can add value to the team. And this was your time,” Saba said on JioHotstar.
“Rishabh Pant was ready. But who took the call to not send him? Was it Pant himself? Was it team management? Was coach involved? Visuals show that Pant was upset at not playing earlier,” he added.
“But, you’re the captain. In the end, the team is playing under you. You have to lead by example. There’s no point of coming to bat for 2 balls. You were needed when Nicholas Pooran was dismissed and LSG were under pressure. The only positive was Ayush Badoni coming near the end and playing his shots,” Saba explained.
After the match, Pant outlined the reason behind holding himself back in the batting order.
“The Idea was to capitalise. We sent Samad to capitalise on a wicket like that. After that, Miller came in, and we just really got stuck in the wicket. Eventually, these are the things we have to figure out and try to find our best combination going forward,” he said after the match.
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