T20 World Cup 2024: Rishabh Pant blasted brutally after a horror show vs KKR? Will it affect WC selection?

Australia's 2015 World Cup-winning captain Michael Clarke slammed Rishabh Pant's tactics for Delhi Capitals' loss against Kolkata Knight Riders last night. 

KKR had hosted 6th placed DC at the Eden Gardens for a reverse fixture in the IPL 2024 season with the hosts winning the contest in a one-sided affair. The story for Rishabh Pant's side remained pretty much the same in their second meeting against the Knight Riders.

In their previous match-up, Kolkata had defeated Delhi by a heavy margin of 106 runs at the ACA-VDCA stadium in Vishakhapatnam. 

Why did Michael Clarke slam Rishabh Pant?

While speaking to Star Sports in the post-match analysis of KKR Vs DC last night, Michael Clarke went all out against visiting captain Rishabh Pant. Clarke was not fond of some of the decisions that Pant took throughout the game, especially his decision to bat first during the coin toss. 

The surface in Eden Gardens last night was not exactly a flat batting track but it did have enough to support the batters in scoring more than 180.

However, Delhi's in-form batting line-up which had scored 252 in their previous match against Mumbai Indians, went inside a shell yesterday in front of KKR's solid bowling department. 

All of the batters including the dangerous Jake Fraser-McGurk as well as captain Rishabh Pant failed to score even 20 runs. The entire batting order walked inside the dressing room cheaply with tailender Kuldeep Yadav being the team's highest scorer against his former outfit. 

Kuldeep Yadav scored 35 off 26 which eventually helped Delhi to post 153 on the board, a score that was looking distant at one point in time. Kuldeep becoming Delhi's top-score last night pretty much sums up the way things went for the Capitals. 

Michael Clarke felt that Rishabh Pant, firstly, should not have elected to bat first. But since he did, the side should have carried on their momentum and put at least 200 on the board. Clarke claimed that DC was well short of 50 runs and that ultimately cost them the entire game.  

"I am not sure if I agree with everything that was said after the game. You win, you get it right, you lose, and then you do not get it right. I think he got it wrong in electing to bat on that surface. And I don’t think they were 10 runs short, they were 50 runs short."

"There were still 3.3 overs left in the run-chase and KKR were only 3 wickets down. KKR would have made at least another 40 if not 50. So, I think DC needed 200 if they were going to bat first." - Michael Clarke said via Star Sports.  

Phil Salt "assaults" his former IPL outfit 

In response to Delhi's target of 154, KKR were 100 up within the 10th over itself. KKR's English opener Phil Salt came back to haunt his former IPL outfit for the second time this season as he smashed 68 off just 33.

Sunil Narine was kept silent as he walked out for a score of 15 whereas Rinku Singh failed to make the most out of his promotion to number 3 as he lost his wicket for 11.

Skipper Shreyas Iyer and Venkatesh Iyer then guided KKR towards their 6th victory of the season by chasing down the total within 16.3 overs.