Even after winning, BCCI punishes Rishabh Pant badly for this reason

Delhi Capitals captain Rishabh Pant might have enjoyed a great victory as well as his first half-century on his return to the cricket field, but it also came at a cost. Pant was fined INR 12 Lakhs by the Indian Premier League officials after the Umpires caught them maintaining a slow over-rate during their first IPL 2024 win against Chennai Super Kings last night. Since it was the outfit’s first offense of the season under the league’s code of conduct for the over rate, only 12 Lakhs was fined.

This comes as the second time that a team captain has been fined for maintaining a slow over rate as Gujarat Titans’ skipper Shubman Gill was the first to get scrutinized by this. Gill too, was charged 12 Lakhs during their second match of the edition against Chennai Super Kings away at the MA Chidambaram stadium. Now Rishabh Pant is the latest to get fined but he might not be that disappointed to give the amount as he was able to contribute to their team’s victory.

It was the first win of the season for Delhi Capitals and it came after 2 attempts. DC had lost their opening match against Punjab Kings by 4 wickets before losing against Rajasthan Royals by 12 runs while trying to chase down a total of 186. Rishabh Pant had scores of 18 and 28 in those matches.

Despite fine, Rishabh Pant helps DC cruise over CSK

Rishabh Pant had come last night with a few adjustments on his technique after his first two attempts of trying to get runs under his belt. He had started off slowly as usual but he accelerated his innings as the game proceeded. At one point, he was playing at run-a-ball 20’s and it was in those death overs that Pant was able to get the bat in full swing.

He targeted certain bowlers of the CSK like Deepak Chahar, Mustafizur Rahman, Ravindra Jadeja, and Matheesha Pathirana. Rishabh Pant had also promoted himself in the batting order as he came in at number 3 instead of his usual position at 4 or 5. That worked wonders for the Delhi-based outfit as they were able to post a 190+ total for the first time this season.

Prithvi Shaw and David Warner had got DC off to a flying start as they stood for a 90+ run partnership before the Australian departed for 52 off 35. Shaw on the other hand got out 10 runs later when Delhi was at 103 with the right-hand batsman scoring a quickfire 43 off 27.

Then it was all Rishabh Pant, who stood for effective partnerships with Mitchell Marsh and then with Axar Patel. At the time of his departure, Pant had scored 51 off 32 balls at a strike rate of 159.38 along with 4 fours and 3 sixes as Pathirana scalped him as his first wicket of the night.

In response to DC’s competitive total, CSK kept losing wickets and were eventually left behind in the game as they lost by 20 runs.

DC set to welcome KKR in their next match

Meanwhile, following their first victory of the season, Rishabh Pant’s Delhi Capitals will welcome the Kolkata Knight Riders at the ACA-VDCA stadium in Vishakhapatnam on April 3rd, Wednesday.