IPL 2025: 'Nawab' Rishabh Pant will find it hard at LSG with key pacers in recovery ward!

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IPL 2025: Rishabh Pant was declared the Nawab of Lucknow when he was bought by LSG for a whopping Rs 27 crores at the Indian Premier League auction in December.

It was Pant's determined decision not to stay with Delhi Capitals, even though it is reported the franchise was ready to cough up Rs 24 crores for him. What was compelling for Rishabh Pant to leave Delhi and migrate to another team, nobody knows.

If you hear it from the Delhi Capitals bosses, where the ownership pattern and running the team is like split captaincy of sorts, JSW does not call the shots now. Yet, Pant wanting to migrate was his own, emphatic decision.

The build-up to IPL 2025 has begun. From Chennai to Bengaluru and Kolkata to Punjab and Delhi to Lucknow, social media is being flooded with images and videos. Lucknow posted the celebration from Holi, which, indeed, is a big festival up North and in Uttar Pradesh. This is where the image seemed blurry. No, nothing wrong with who clicked the photos but how this team will find it hard to live up to the Giant name added to Lucknow Super?

For those who are saying Mayank Yadav will be fit by April, that is like hyping a once-upon-a-time blue chip caught in a bear run at the bourses. Mayank may have bowled a few fast and furious deliveries in the IPL 2024 before he broke down. At the same time, LSG will also be without Mohsin Khan and Avesh Khan.

Add to it an untested Akash Deep in T20 format, the LSG pace attack looks dead. Imagine, calling up past warriors Shardul Thakur and Shivam Mavi in Holi celebrations at LSG is clear these are the men who will have to deliver for them. One cannot write off the past masters of fast bowling and medium pace bowling, be it Shardul Thakur, Shivam Mavi, Bhuvneshwar Kumar (RCB) and T Natarajan (Delhi Capitals).

The worst part is how a younger bowler is supposed to be super fit, stays unfit. It is not as if Mayank Yadav got injured recently. He has a reputation of being unfit from his days in Delhi cricket as well. Insiders say even at Delhi in the domestic season, he was one of those resisting hard work in fitness.

It is also well-known that the NCA, or what is now known as the Centre For Excellence in Bengaluru, does get intimidated when it comes to speaking on the fitness of well-known players, be it batters or bowlers. See how nobody is willing to speak a word on the back injury of Jasprit Bumrah. There is stone silence, from the BCCI and even Mumbai Indians.

In the case of injuries to key fast bowlers for LSG, it is shameful, throwing the whole team composition into disarray. If dishonesty in fitness is caught, it is shameful. There is no way any athlete should play when unfit. And in T20 cricket, which is like two months in a year of IPL, some have decided they will prepare only for it. Mayank's fitness, or the lack of it, is a massive case of overhype. To think that the LSG owners will be smiling is wrong. They are already smarting.

One man who will be worst affected is new captain Rishabh Pant. He is the cynosure as the most expensive buy of the last IPL auction. Should LSG do badly this time in the IPL 2025 edition, he will face the music. IPL fans and critics are ruthless, they can hype you and also sink you.

Rishabh Pant needs to brace up for a massive challenge ahead of him with the entire fast bowling plan landing up at the recovery wards in Bengaluru. Don't forget, Pant was celebrated when he made a miraculous comeback in IPL 2024 and then headed back to glory in international cricket.