Following his team's six-wicket defeat to Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) on May 19, a loss that dashed their playoff aspirations, Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) captain Rishabh Pant attributed his side's disappointing IPL 2025 season to the 'gaps' created in their squad due to injuries sustained after the auction. Pant stated that while the team had initially 'decided not to dwell on' these absences, they progressively became 'difficult to fill' and ultimately proved costly for LSG.
At the beginning of the season, LSG were significantly impacted by injuries to their entire frontline pace attack, including Mohsin Khan, Akash Deep, Avesh Khan, and Mayank Yadav. Despite this setback, the team started their campaign strongly, securing five wins in their first eight matches. However, they subsequently endured a four-match losing streak, even with the return of three of those key pacers to the playing eleven.
We had a lot of gaps, injuries: Rishabh Pant after LSG's elimination
“Definitely it could have been one of our best seasons but coming into the tournament, we had a lot of gaps, injuries and as a team we decided to not talk about that, but it became difficult to fill those gaps for us. The way we planned the auction, if we had had the same bowling. But this is cricket, sometimes things go your way and sometimes they don’t, we take pride in the way we played and take the positives from the season than the negative side. We have a strong batting line up, have enough firepower and that is the biggest positive for the season, even for bowlers, a lot of times they bowled in good areas but they were patchy," Pant said in the post-match presentation.
However, the challenges faced by LSG extended beyond just injuries. Captain Rishabh Pant himself experienced a dip in form, managing only 135 runs in his eleven innings thus far. Furthermore, his decision-making in certain matches also came under scrutiny. Even in the crucial match against SRH, Pant was dismissed for a mere 7 runs off 6 balls, contributing to the team only reaching a total of 205 for 7 in their first innings, despite a strong 115-run opening partnership. In the subsequent innings, while leg-spinner Digvesh Rathi managed to take two wickets, Abhishek Sharma's explosive half-century and Heinrich Klaasen's composed 47 ensured that SRH successfully chased down the target in the 19th over.
“We knew we were 10 runs short because the wicket was playing well, like I said before, we are playing well in patches and unable to close the momentum whenever it turned up on our side. The first half of the season we played really well but the second half it became tougher and tougher to catch up with the teams on the brighter side. The bowler Rathi has come up nicely for us, his first season, the way he bowled, he is one of the positives, but you need to keep improving yourself and get better and better as the seasons go," Pant concluded.
Even if LSG manage to win their remaining two matches against GT and RCB, the highest position they can achieve in the league standings is fifth place, with a total of 14 points. LSG will take on Gujarat Titans (GT) on May 22 while SRH will next face Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) on May 23