The Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) were handed a hammering 110-run defeat by the Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) on Sunday at the Arun Jaitley stadium and the reigning IPL champions finished-off their campaign on a highly negative note. After electing to bat first, the Hyderabad-based franchise smashed the third-highest total in IPL history thanks to an unbeaten knock of 105 from Heinrich Klaasen. Travis Head also gave valiant contributions with his fiery inning of 76 as SRH finished their 20 overs on 278/3.
In reply, KKR's innings never really got going and they lost wickets on regular intervals. Jaydev Unadkat, Eshan Malinga and Harsh Dubey picked up 3 wickets each as KKR got bundled out for only 168 runs. It was a severely poor all-round performance from the Kolkata-based franchise who got dominated by their opponents throughout the match.
Ajinkya Rahane highlighted their batting unit's poor performance
After the crushing defeat, KKR skipper Ajinkya Rahane admitted that the batters weren't able to perform as per the expectations laid upon them and added that there were 2-3 players, whose poor performances especially hurt the team in the batting department.
“See, sometimes what happens is, when you have a couple of good seasons as an individual, you put a lot of expectation and pressure on yourself. I feel that was the case for most of the batters to prove how good I am, and it is completely natural. As a human being, when you are doing well and you had a couple of good seasons, it's very normal to have those expectations from yourself and also from the people," Rahane said at the post-match press conference.
“I'm sure players, our boys, will learn from the mistakes, as there was lots to learn from this season. As a team, not for any particular individual, but for everyone. So many learnings from this season, but it can happen to any player. Unfortunately, 2-3 players were going through that phase for us, and that was the reason we couldn't do well in our batting unit," he added.
KKR really struggled as a batting unit throughout their IPL 2025 campaign. Rahane was the side's top-scorer for the season with 390 runs, followed by youngster Angkrish Raghuvanshi, who has 300 runs under his belt. Venkatesh Iyer, who was acquired by the franchise for a humongous fee of INR 23.75 crore at the IPL mega auction last year, only managed to score 142 runs in 11 matches.
“But again, they are pretty much experienced enough to handle this situation. I'm sure they will come back stronger next year. That's why I said, when you have those expectations on yourself, you unknowingly put pressure whenever you go on to bat or when you bowl. So I'm sure Rinku, Raman, all the players, they will learn from the mistakes and come back stronger,” Rahane explained.
It was quite a disappointing campaign for KKR, who dominated in the previous season and went on to beat the Hyderabad-based franchise in a one-sided final to lift their third IPL title. With the triumph also came a lot of expectations, however the side certainly wasn't able to live upto them and ended up failing big time.