BCCI bans Rishabh Pant, big blow to Delhi in the race for playoffs

Rishabh Pant Banned: Delhi Capitals have made a strong comeback in IPL 2024 and the team is strongly in the race for the playoffs. The team now has to play its last 2 matches and with victory in these two matches, it can get a place in the playoffs. The team's next match is against Royal Challengers Bangalore but just before this match, Delhi has suffered a huge blow. BCCI has banned team captain Rishabh Pant for one match. Due to this, Pant will no longer be able to play the match against Bengaluru. Apart from Pant, his fellow players have also been fined by BCCI.

The match is to be played between Bengaluru and Delhi at M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Sunday, May 12, but a day before this, Delhi got this bad news. In a press release from IPL, it was told that Delhi captain Pant has received this punishment due to the team's slow over rate. Delhi team made this mistake for the third time this season. According to the rules, for committing such a mistake for the first and second time, the captain and the team only have to pay a fine, but after repeating it for the third time, the captain is directly banned.

Even the appeal was of no avail

The match referee gave this punishment to Pant due to slow over rate in the match against Rajasthan Royals. It has been told in the press release that Delhi had appealed against this decision, after which the BCCI Ombudsman held a virtual hearing on it. Here too Delhi and Pant did not get relief because the Lokpal found the decision of the referee to be correct and upheld it. In this way, apart from the suspension of one match, a fine of Rs 30 lakh has also been imposed on Pant. Not only Pant, but other players and impact players who were part of the playing eleven have also been fined Rs 12 lakh or 50 percent of the match fee (whichever is less).

Pant's strong performance

Rishabh Pant has scored 413 runs in 12 innings so far this season at an average of 41 and strike rate of 156, which is currently the highest for Delhi. Pant, who returned to cricket action about one and a quarter years after the accident, has scored 3 half-centuries this season and has been scoring runs continuously. In such a situation, Delhi is going to miss Pant a lot. Not only is he batting powerfully, but his wicket-keeping has also been excellent and he has looked better than before in captaincy as well.