Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) suffered their seventh defeat in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) when the Mumbai Indians (MI) defeated them by six wickets at the Wankhede Stadium on Monday, May 4.
After a string of dismal performances, LSG batter Ayush Badoni was dropped from the side for Monday's clash. However, it didn't make much difference as Akshat Raghuwanshi, who replaced him, scored just 11 runs off seven balls on his IPL debut.
Badoni has only managed to score 172 runs in eight innings
in IPL 2026 at an average of 21.50 and a strike rate of 140.99. The right-handed batter was severely criticised by Kris Srikkanth, who opined that he can't clear the inner circle with the bat and has only two shots in his arsenal. The cricketer-turned-expert also shared his views on Lucknow's abysmal campaign in this year's IPL.
"Ayush Badoni can't even hit over the inner circle. Having only two shots, he has been playing five years for you. If you ask them, they'll point to his average and other numbers, which is the biggest mistake made by everyone. For such a pathetic showing, they have so many renowned names in their coaching staff," Srikkanth said on Star Sports.
"This team has no scope for progress. Their captain and the entire team is clueless. They have a good bowling lineup but everything else is hopeless. They made Ayush Badoni open. They brought an out of form Rinku Singh back in form from 88/6. That's how poor their team and Pant's captaincy has been," he added.
Rishabh Pant's own performances have been affected by captaincy: Sadagoppan Ramesh
Former India opener Sadagoppan Ramesh mentioned that Rishabh Pant has struggled with the bat because the added pressure of captaincy is taking its toll. On Monday, the wicketkeeper-batter scored just 15 runs off 10 balls on a belter of a track.
"Rishabh Pant's own performances have been affected by captaincy over the last two years. The captains of the teams doing well are performing individually without letting captaincy affecting them. Just this affects winning by 30 to 40 percent. Rishabh Pant isn't able to do that. He is also making a lot of tactical blunders," said Ramesh (via the aforementioned source).
"Bowling Digvesh Rathi in the 20th over and initially batting at No.3, while changing the opening position are all glaring examples. Someone like Pooran should have been tried at No.3 long back. Neither is he clear on what he needs to do to perform nor does he know how to extract the best from others. His overall thinking has to improve a lot," he added.
