Pooran on fire as Super Giants outshine Sunrisers in Hyderabad

football27 March 2025 17:48| © MWP
By:Neil Manthorp
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Nicholas Pooran smashed an astonishing 70 from just 26 balls to lead the Lucknow Super Giants to an emphatic five-wicket victory with 23 balls to spare in their IPL match against the Sunrisers Hyderabad at the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium in Hyderabad on Thursday.

The high-scoring Sunrisers posted a respectable 190-9 after being asked to bat first but on such a high-scoring ground it proved to be below par with the visitors coasting to 193-5 in just 16.1 with a half-fit Mitch Marsh, used an Impact Player to open the innings, crashing 52 from 31 balls with seven fours and two sixes.

Trinidadian left-hander Pooran was in extraordinary form with half a dozen fours and another six sixes appearing to hit every ball exactly where he wanted, apparently knowing exactly what would be bowled to him. The nature of T20 cricket.

Sunrisers captain Pat Cummins (2-29) removed countryman Marsh before trapping Pooran lbw to give his team a glimmer of hope which increased with the fall of Ayush Badoni (6) and captain Rishabh Pant (15) who sliced a high full-toss from Mohammad Shami to cover and was evidently appalled that it was not called a no-ball.

But despite slipping from 154-3 to 164-5 Lucknow were so far ahead of the game having reduced the asking rate to less than a run-a-ball that Abdul Samad could easily have nudged his team to victory.

Instead he smashed an eyeballs-out 22 from eight balls with a brace of fours and sixes.

David Miller escorted him over the finish line with 13* from seven balls with two fours.

Earlier Shardul Thakur (4-34) but a quick dent in the Sunrisers innings with the wickets of Abhishek Sharma (6) and Ishan Kishan (0) but Australian opener Travis Head was undeterred belting 47 from 28 balls while Aniket Verma smashed 36 from only 13 balls with five sixes.

But the most extraordinary innings came from SRH captain Cummins, who heaved his first three balls for six before holing out against his fourth for an innings of 18 from four balls.

SUNRISERS HYDERABAD: Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, Ishan Kishan (wk), Nitish Kumar Reddy, Heinrich Klaasen, Aniket Verma, Abhinav Manohar, Pat Cummins (capt), Simarjeet Singh, Harshal Patel, Mohammed Shami

LUCKNOW SUPER GIANTS: Aiden Markram, Nicholas Pooran, Rishabh Pant (capt & wk), Ayush Badoni, David Miller, Abdul Samad, Shardul Thakur, Ravi Bishnoi, Avesh Khan, Digvesh Rathi, Prince Yadav