IPL 2022: Rishabh Pant vs KL Rahul - An audition for the future as Delhi Capitals take on Lucknow Super Giants

Pant and KL Rahul are young leaders. They still have a lot of catching up to do. While Rahul’s captaincy acumen has come under a lot of scrutiny – especially when he was captaining Punjab Kings, and also during India’s recent tour to South Africa – Pant led Delhi Capitals to third place in the 2021 IPL.

This year Rahul is leading IPL newbies Lucknow Super Giants and has enjoyed a better start, captaincy-wise, than previous seasons. Although LSG lost their opening encounter to Gujarat Titans by a whisker, they came back with wins in the next two games against Chennai Super Kings and Sunrisers Hyderabad. Rahul’s captaincy came in for praise during the match against SRH.

His move to give the 18th over to Avesh Khan changed the course of the match. Hyderabad were cruising towards victory, needing 33 runs off the last three overs with six wickets remaining and two set batters – Nicholas Pooran and Washington Sundar – going smoothly at the crease. But Avesh first sent back Pooran to the pavilion and then got the wicket of big-hitter Abdul Samad off the next delivery to tilt the scales in Lucknow’s favour.

Rahul’s management of the bowlers during the SRH match, which was also affected by dew, was excellent. In contrast, it has been a mixed start for Pant. In his first game of the season, against Mumbai Indians, Pant allowed MI to put up a score of 177/5 after being down 122/4 by the end of the 16th over.

It seemed he was at his wits end during the slog overs. He also didn’t have any death-overs specialist at his disposal. His go-to death bowler in the 2021 season, Anrich Nortje, wasn’t fit and missed the game.