Half-centuries by Nicholas Pooran (61) and Aiden Markram (58) propelled Lucknow Super Giants to a six-wicket victory, with three balls to spare, over the table toppers Gujarat Titans at the Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Cricket Stadium here on Saturday.

After Gujarat Titans reached 180/6 in the first innings, powered by half-centuries by openers Shubman Gill’s 60 and Sai Sudharsan’s fourth half-century of the tournament, Markram walked out to bat with an unlikely opening partner in Rishabh Pant (21), with Mitchell Marsh not in the matchday squad due to personal reasons.

Pant, who has struggled through the course of the season, stayed on the backfoot as Markram took the fight to the GT bowlers in the opening exchanges. Mohammed Siraj was taken to the cleaners as they racked up 20 runs in the third over.

Punjab Kings won the toss and elected to bat first against Sunrisers Hyderabad in Match 27 of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium here on Saturday. The 22-year-old Sri Lanka pacer, Eshan Malinga, will make his IPL debut for Sunrisers Hyderabad, replacing compatriot Kamindu Mendis, whereas Punjab Kings decided to go ahead with the same playing XI.

Punjab Kings' captain Shreyas Iyer said, "We are going to bat. In the last few games, we have batted first, and we have the ability to post good scores. We want to play some aggressive cricket, that's our mindset at the moment. We have seen that we don't have a fantastic record in the power-play. We don't have that thought at the back of our minds. Every individual in our team plays their own brand of cricket. We have to be top-notch and need to back our instincts. We have to keep repeating that again and again. Playing with the same team."

Skipper Shubman Gill has become the first player to reach the 2000-run milestone for the Gujarat Titans franchise in the Indian Premier League. He achieved the feat while scoring 60 runs against the Lucknow Super Giants in the first innings on Saturday.

Gill joined the newly made franchise in 2022 and has played 51 games for the franchise. After the departure of Hardik Pandya in 2024, Gill was made skipper and is now in his second season as captain of the side. So far, he has scored 2007 runs for the team at an average of 44.60 and a strike rate of 147.89.

The 25-year-old scored 483 runs in his first season for the team before proceeding to have a stellar 2023 campaign, where Gujarat lost in the final to Chennai Super Kings (CSK), as he racked 890 runs in 17 games at an average of 59.33 with his highest score being 129 against Mumbai Indians in the second qualifier. He recorded three centuries and four half-centuries in the campaign.

Ahead of Delhi Capitals (DC) first Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 game at the Arun Jaitley Stadium against Mumbai Indians (MI), lower-order batter Ashutosh Sharma stated that every member in the set-up is aware of how to play on the pitch, citing their previous experience of playing at the venue during the domestic cricket season.

DC had a small camp at this venue in March before having a pre-season preparatory camp in Visakhapatnam. Last year, the pitches were full of runs for both teams, and eventually topped the run-rate charts venues wise.

Lucknow Super Giants pulled things back in their favour with some excellent bowling after fifties by openers Shubman Gill (60) and Sai Sudharsan (53) and restricted Gujarat Titans to 180/6 in 20 overs in Match 26 of Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 at the Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Cricket Stadium here on Saturday.

Spinner Ravi Bishnoi and pacer Shardul Thakur struck twice each, while Avesh Khan and Digvesh Rathi claimed a wicket each as LSG came back to prevent table-toppers Gujarat Titans from posting a big total.

Asked to bat first, Gujarat once again relied on the excellent technique on display by openers Gill and Sudharsan as the duo put up an opening stand of 120 runs to lay the foundation for a big total.

Sudharsan, who is the current occupant of the Orange Cap, showed his intent from the very first delivery when he played a late cut off Shardul Thakur to find the boundary. The duo racked up six boundaries and one six in the Power-play, while rotating the strike, to reach 54/0 as the field restrictions were lifted.

Chennai Super Kings batting coach Mike Hussey is still hopeful of change of fortunes for the five-time champions in the IPL 2025 season and making to the playoffs despite losing five matches in a row.

CSK are enduring their worst IPL campaign as it is the first time they lost five games on the trot in the tournament's history. Adding to it, the eight-wicket defeat against defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders on Friday was their third in a row at Chepauk in a season - which has also happened for the first time.

"We are certainly not putting the white flag up just yet. You only have to get in to scrape into that fourth place. And a big, long tournament like the IPL, it is about momentum," Hussey said in the post-match press conference.

After a solid 18-run win over Chennai Super Kings (CSK) earlier this week in the ongoing edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025, Punjab Kings are all set to face Sunrisers Hyderabad at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, Hyderabad, on Saturday.

While Shreyas Iyer's side has won three out of their four games, the hosts have lost four games on the trot and are in search of a win. But Punjab Kings' youngster Nehal Wadhera insisted that his side will not take the opposition lightly ahead of the upcoming encounter.

Speaking at the pre-match press conference, the left-handed batter said, "SRH is a very dangerous side. Though they lost a few games, it does not mean that they are of any less concern to us. They are definitely a strong team on paper as well. We are not taking this game any lightly. We are preparing equally hard as we did for the previous games. We are hopeful we can beat them on their home ground."

The Kings will be entering the match after a spectacular batting performance against CSK that saw youngster Priyansh Arya knock a memorable hundred. Wadhera said the entire team is brimming with confidence and there is a positive atmosphere in the dressing room

England's record wicket-taker in Test cricket, James Anderson has been given the knighthood in former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's resignation honours list and was the only sportsperson to be given the award. Anderson was previously awarded with an OBE medal by the Prince of Wales at Buckingham Palace back in 2016.

Anderson retired from international cricket following England's emphatic innings and 114 runs win against West Indies in the first Test at Lord's in July, 2024 where he scalped four wickets across two innings. His decision to retire from international duty came after England coach Brendon McCullum and captain Ben Stokes decided they wanted to build an attack for the future.

The 41-year-old closed his red-ball career with 704 wickets for England. He retired from the format as the highest wicket-taker as a fast bowler and is the third-highest wicket-taker overall after Muttiah Muralidaran (800) of Sri Lanka and Australia's Shane Warne (708) in Test cricket.

Moeen Ali was included in the playing eleven of defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) as captain Ajinkya Rahane won the toss and elected to bowl first against the MS Dhoni-led Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in Match 25 of Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 at the MA Chidambaram Stadium here on Friday.

Both CSK and KKR are ranked ninth and sixth, respectively, in the points table, and come into Friday’s clash on the back of defeats in their respective last games to Punjab Kings (PBKS) and Lucknow Super Giants (LSG). After winning the toss, Rahane said all-rounder Moeen replaces left-arm fast-bowler Spencer Johnson in the playing eleven.

KKR’s move to bring Moeen in at Chepauk is a tactical one, considering CSK have left-handed batters in Devon Conway, Rachin Ravindra, Shivam Dube, and Ravindra Jadeja. “There were a lot of positives from the last game. We as a team played really well.

The fervent crowd at Bengaluru’s M. Chinnaswamy Stadium is usually a massive home advantage for the Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) during the IPL. But on Thursday night, to hear the fans chant for an opposing player at RCB home turf in the IPL was quite telling.

The big reason fans draped in RCB colours did that in the stadium was their local lad, aka ‘namma huduga’ (own boy in Kannada) KL Rahul, who owned the stage on his homecoming by hitting a match-winning 93 not out off 53 balls and maintaining Delhi Capitals’ unbeaten run in IPL 2025.

It was a knock where Rahul had to grind it out on a sluggish black-soil pitch, before flicking a switch from the 12th over and accelerating stunningly to take DC home with 13 balls to spare. Following his winning shot - a six over the long-leg boundary off Yash Dayal’s full toss - Rahul proudly thumped his chest, as the crowd cheered loudly and some stood up to show respect for the local hero who secured the victory, albeit for DC.

If that wasn’t enough, Rahul walked to the adjoining pitch, drew a circle there with his bat and put it down fiercely in the middle, mirroring an iconic scene one of his favourite movies Kantara. Just after that mic drop moment, Rahul embraced Tristan Stubbs and said, ‘This is my ground’.