New Delhi: After yet another failed campaign to win the Indian Premier League, Delhi Capitals have identified their misfiring opening pair as a prime reason for their doomed campaign.
Delhi plunged to a 59-run loss to Mumbai Indians on Wednesday, their fifth loss in last seven matches, which knocked them out of the play-offs race.
They had begun their 2025 campaign on a bright note, winning their first four matches but then their top-order batting woes began. Delhi tried as many as seven opening partners in 13 matches with little success.
“A settled opening pair is only possible when your opening pair gives you a start. If you don’t get starts, you are bound to make changes to try and fill that gap, fill that void,” Badani said after their loss in Mumbai.
“If you go back and see the other sides which have had great starts and great powerplays with the bat, we haven’t had those starts and hence we’ve had to make those changes.
“We had Jake (Fraser-McGurk) at the top earlier, it didn’t work for us. Abishek (Porel), then we had Faf (du Plessis), then we also had Karun (Nair) to come in. It’s just that we haven’t had anyone really making sure, ensuring that we get off to good starts.
“Our opening at the top was a worry for us and I think one of the reasons why we haven’t gone forward,” he added.
Badani also pointed put that DC also failed to close out wins in a few closely-fought matches, reminding of their loss to Mumbai in Delhi.
“We had a great sprint to start with. If I’m not mistaken, (we had) five wins in (first) six games. That’s a great place to be,” he said.
“Since then we’ve just struggled and we’ve not found that win. To some extent we’ve also had games where I genuinely felt that we could have won and we just didn’t finish those games.
“For instance even (against) Mumbai at Delhi, the game (in which) Karun Nair got 90 odd, we were cantering along and we lost the game from there. Even the game against KKR, we had to get 60 in six (overs) with seven wickets in hand, (and we had) two set batters.
“We missed out there. You want to ideally finish those games. If you want to win this competition, if you want to go to the playoffs, you want to ideally finish those games and if you don’t finish those games, then you have no one else to blame but yourself,” the former India batter said.
Delhi plunged to a 59-run loss to Mumbai Indians on Wednesday, their fifth loss in last seven matches, which knocked them out of the IPL 2025 play-offs race. Cricket Sports News: Latest Cricket News, Cricket Live Score, Sports Breaking News from Sports Today
