Breaking down professional sport is best left to experts but, occasionally, their take leaves ordinary fans dissatisfied with the answers .
₹27 Crore during the 2025 Auction. (AFP)” title=”Lucknow Super Giants’ captain Rishabh Pant had made history by becoming the most expensive player in IPL history after he was picked for ₹27 Crore during the 2025 Auction. (AFP)” />Rishabh Pant’s role during Lucknow Super Giant’s loss to Delhi Capitals is one such instance. Batting first, his team was in a spot of bother with wickets falling at regular intervals. Captain Pant was all set for action -padded up, hand taped with plaster, willow in hand. Yet, to the utter surprise of everyone, he chose the safety of the dug out instead of striding out to the middle to take on the opposition .
The reluctance (or at least it looked like that) to step up and get into battle was like a soldier refusing to take up arms. Why was Rishabh stuck to the dugout? Was this – some kind of batting googly, a smart strategic master stroke, or simple dereliction of duty?
If asked to explain this shocking absence, the likely answer from experts would be: Good question! Which, translated into simple words, means I don’t know.
The LSG coaches, thinktank and team management will surely justify what happened but Pant’s missing from action does not add up.
What we know, is this: Pant was held back because, given the match situation, Abdul Samad, David Miller and Ayush Badoni (the impact player) were presumably better suited to get the job done.
Accept this at face value, but only with a generous dose of salt. There are multiple reasons why this argument is extremely weak. Pant is LSG’s captain, the ‘face’ of the team and its leader. You’d expect him to be in the middle to take control, tough it out and rescue the team.
Instead of leading from the front, Pant receded quietly to the background, waving others in. This is as bizarre as a head of government proposing a no-confidence motion against himself . This is also as close as you get to cricket appointing a non-playing captain, like tennis in the Davis Cup.
Besides the sorry matter of a leader abdicating his position, do remember that Pant is a top-quality player and there are not many, at LSG or elsewhere, who are better. He is proven superstar of this format – a destructive striker feared by bowlers the world over. Why was he, of all people, ducking for cover? Are Samad and Badoni really better than him? Good question!
Only yesterday, LSG considered Pant their silver bullet after the messy break-up with KL Rahul, the previous captain who was found not fit for purpose.
They turned to Pant for his brand of batting and his leadership qualities. The franchise was determined , almost desperate, to get him at any cost. That’s why they happily paid ₹27 crore, the highest-ever player salary in the IPL.
Now, that solid faith, seen in the context of the no show against DC appears drowned in irony. Pant, the inspirational leader, to create an aggressive team culture? Well, well! Pant, the daredevil batting enforcer? Ouch!
There is one more perplexing piece to the drama. After missing from action during the entire innings, Pant walked out for a last-minute guest appearance, with just 2 balls remaining. Perhaps he wanted to smash two sixes to make some statement. He failed to score and the question is , why come at all like a student who skips class but surfaces before the bell to mark his attendance. Or , maybe this was Rishabh’s version of providing Dhoni like darshan to fans. But the difference was, in this case, no fans were screaming with joy.
Quite likely the true facts of what happened will never be public and maybe it’s not even important to dwell on this beyond a point . Sport is never a straight, exact science , it unfolds in weird ways and demands on-the-go decisions that fail the test of hindsight. That said, it’s certain that brand Rishabh has taken a colossal beating and his stock hit by market volatility.
There are some larger questions too, beyond just Pant and the freaky batting order changes. Are captains, apart from the big boys, getting pushed into a corner by powerful coaches/support staff sitting on the sidelines. Has support staff and data occupied space traditionally owned solely by the captain? Is T20 cricket moving towards collective leadership where the captain is one of many, not the dominant player holding a veto over key decisions?
I remember what Tiger Pataudi once said about cricket, and captaining a side: It’s simple, but people complicate it unnecessarily.
