Tag: IPL 2025

Hyderabad (TIP)- Shardul Thakur’s four-wicket haul and a sensational display of power-hitting from Nicholas Pooran set up a five-wicket win for Lucknow Super Giants over Sunrisers Hyderabad in an IPL match here on Thursday, March 27.
Shardul continued his dream comeback returning with figures of 4/34 to help LSG restrict a power-packed SRH to 190 for nine before Pooran (70 off 26; 6x4s, 6x6s) displayed his 360 degree hitting skills.
Pooran shared quick-fire match-winning 116 runs for the second wicket with Marsh (52 off 31) to help LSG chase down the target in 16.1 overs. LSG didn’t have the best start to their chase as they lost Aiden Markram early. But thereafter, it was the effortless hitting from Mitchell Marsh and Nicholas Pooran that helped LSG surge ahead.
Pooran in particular was at his attacking best as he mostly dealt in sixes, clobbering Simarjeet and Abhishek Sharma for huge sixes during his knock, mostly towards the square boundary.
SRH just found it difficult to stop Pooran as he didn’t even spare Cummins, hitting him for two fours in his first over to reach 77 for 1 in the powerplay.
Pooran brought up the fastest fifty of this season in just 18 balls with another huge six over square leg of Adam Zampa. Pooran’s magnificent knock was cut short by Cummins, trapped in front of the wickets in the ninth over. After Pooran’s dismissal, Marsh took the onus on him and brought up his half-century of just 29 balls.
LSG skipper Rishabh Pant (15 off 15) could not do much but Abdul Samad played a entertaining cameo to get his side home.
Earlier opting bowl, Shardul (4/34) gave LSG a fiery start, removing Abishek Sharma and last match centurion Ishan Kishan in consecutive balls in the third over.
Shardul sent packing Sharma with a short delivery before getting Ishan Kishan caught behind off an innocuous delivery down the leg side.
Travis Head (47 off 28), however, looked in ominous form as he took the attack to the opposition and used his brute power to deal in boundaries and sixes.
Head was particularly brutal against Avesh Khan, who sprayed the ball on both sides, with the Australian hitting him for two sixes and one four to pick up 18 runs in the fourth over.
Head, however, was lucky as he got two reprieves.
Head skied Ravi Bishnoi’s first ball down the ground, and Pooran stationed at long-on had all the time in the world to get under the ball and take a simple catch but the West Indian put it down. The missed chance proved costly as Head slammed Bishnoi over covers for a maximum.
Bishnoi had another chance to claim the wicket of Head in the fifth ball of the sixth over but he failed to latch on to a difficult return catch. But Head’s luck finally ran out when fast bowler Prince Yadav disturbed his timbers to pick up his first IPL wicket.
Henrich Klaasen (26 off 17) was looking dangerous but got out in a bizarre fashion, run out by Yadav off his own bowling as a straight drive from Nitish Reddy ricocheted on to the sumps from the bowlers follow through.
SRH skipper Pat Cummins (18 off 4) hit three sixes of his first three balls before departing. Source: PTI

MUMBAI (tip) : Virat Kohli, Phil Salt and Rajat Patidar fired on all cylinders as RCB thrashed KKR by seven wickets to kick off IPL 2025 in style.
RCB would have been happy at the innings break after restricting KKR to 174/8 and they were about to rub more salt in KKR’s wounds as the opening pair of Phil Salt and Virat Kohli showed the bowlers no mercy.
After a relatively sedate first two overs that went for 17, the onslaught began when pacer Vaibhav Arora, who was the impact sub for Angkrish Raghuvanshi, was hammered for 20.
That prompted skipper Rahane to bring on his strike bowler Varun Chakravarthy, fresh off his exploits in the Champions Trophy. But he was treated with disdain by Salt who blasted 4, 6, 4 and 4 off the last four balls of the over, which went for 21.
Kohli joined the party hitting Spencer Johnson for successive sixes as RCB breezed to 75/0 in five overs.
Salt reached his fifty on his RCB debut off just 25 balls. He fell soon after for 56 off 31 balls but the damage was done. It was Chakravarthy who made the breakthrough as Salt got an outside edge to be snapped up by Spencer Johnson at short third man.
Chakravarthy closed out his spell with figures of 1/43, a recovery of sorts after that horror first over. RCB lost impact sub Padikkal cheaply to Narine for just 10, which brought Patidar to the crease. The RCB skipper slammed four boundaries off Harshit Rana in the 15th over as RCB cruised to 157/2.
Patidar fell to Arora in the 16th over for 34 off 16 balls by which time it was all over bar the shouting. The next over by Johnson saw Liam Livingstone hitting a six and four off the first two balls as RCB closed out an emphatic win with 22 balls to spare.
Kohli remained unbeaten on 59 to hold the coveted Orange Cap at the end of the first game.
Earlier, KKR struggled to force the pace in the death overs. The last recognised batsman Angkrish Raghuvanshi fell to Yash Dayal in the penultimate over, which went for just four runs.
Raghuvanshi made a useful 30 off 22 balls — he was the only batsman to reach 30 apart from Rahane and Narine. The final over by Hazlewood saw only five more runs accrue to KKR, which finished at a disappointing 174/8 in 20 overs.
It was very much an innings of two halves — KKR clobbered 107/1 off the first 10 overs but could only manage 67/7 in the next 10.
KKR vice captain Venkatesh Iyer, who was bought back by the franchise for a mammoth Rs 23.75 crore at the mega auction, fell cheaply for six to the first ball of the 13th over, dragging a delivery from Krunal Pandya back onto his stumps.
Pandya struck again in his next over, castling dangerman Rinku Singh for 12 off the last ball of his spell to end up with the splendid figures of 4/29.
Patidar then took the bold step of bringing back leggie Suyash Sharma who had taken some punishment, going for 41 in his first three overs.
But it paid off as a googly foxed the swashbuckler Andre Russell who went for a slog and missed completely to see his stumps shattered. After Russell’s departure for four, KKR limped to 151/6 in 16 overs.
Suyash Sharma finished his spell with figures of 1/47 and was immediately subbed off, with Devdutt Padikkal coming on as the impact sub. (ap)