Picture Credit: X/@StarSports
Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) owner Sanjiv Goenka’s equation with Rishabh Pant's name has become a hot topic nowadays. Pant hasn’t looked confident with his bat and leadership in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 yet. Under his captaincy, Lucknow have got only one win off their three matches. As a batter, he could amass only 17 runs in those outings, at an extremely miserable average of 5.66. Pant’s underwhelming performance has become a major talking point among cricket supporters due to his heavy price tag. It is to be noted that LSG snapped him for a humongous sum of INR 27 Crore at the IPL 2025 auction to reserve his services for the season. With this amount, he has become the costliest IPL player. After attaining the feat, his failure in the competition is getting hard to digest for cricket fans.
In recent games, it’s witnessed that the LSG owner holds intense conversations with Pant after matches. Noting the chats between both figures, some fans believe Goenka is overindulging in his team’s affairs. However, in Pant’s difficult times with the bat, Goenka has spoken positive words for the 27-year-old.
In an interview with Star Sports, the LSG owner showed faith in Pant’s leadership prowess and said, “The moment we knew he’s not being rated, we planned the team around him. I’ve said this before, I’ve no hesitation saying it again, I believe he’s a great leader. His best leadership is yet to come. So 27 the number we got him at. If it meant 28 that would’ve been the number so we were very clear. We needed a leader who trusts and backs his instincts who’s fearless, who’s destructive and in Rishabh, we get all of that."
LSG bats first in the home game against MI in IPL 2025
LSG are hosting Mumbai Indians (MI) in the 16th match of IPL 2025 at the Ekana Cricket Stadium. In the ongoing game, MI skipper Hardik Pandya emerged victorious at the toss and put the hosts to bat first. As of writing, 12.2 overs have been bowled and Lucknow have lost three batters at a score of 118. Mitchell Marsh delivered a solid start to LSG, scoring 60 off just 31.
However, Rishabh Pant amassed another failure as he got dismissed after scoring two off six. Hardik Pandya got rid of him in the 11th over of the match. Both Mumbai and Lucknow have won only one game in the competition and both sides will look to display fighting spirit to win the contest.
