The Mumbai Indians’ (MI) owner Akash Ambani’s outrage at a decision made by captain Hardik Pandya during the most recent IPL 2025 match between MI and the Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) captured the public’s attention. On Friday, April 4, at the Ekana Stadium in Lucknow, Mumbai lost their third away game of the season, falling 12 runs short in the run chase despite Pandya’s all-around heroics.
In their first four games of the 2025 season, the five-time IPL winners had only managed one victory. Hardik Pandya, who chose to bowl first,
put on an incredible display with the ball, taking his first T20 five-wicket haul and becoming the first skipper in IPL history to do so. His attempts to prevent the house from writing 203 on the board, however, were insufficient.
Check the tweet below:
Akash Ambani is going to remove Hardik Pandya from captaincy😂 {Mark My Words} pic.twitter.com/MtODQb8LEy
— Gillfied⁷ (@Gill_Iss) April 4, 2025
The final over of MI’s pursuit was the true talking point. The all-rounder who was supposed to finish things off with the bat started the over with a six off Avesh Khan, needing 22 from six balls. The 31-year-old, however, kept strike and denied replacement batsman Mitchell Santner an opportunity to face the ball on the third and fourth deliveries of the over by refusing to take singles despite obvious possibilities. But Ambani’s obvious annoyance at Pandya’s choice to accept the responsibility alone was captured on tape.
This was immediately following MI’s audacious decision to “retire out” Tilak Varma and substitute Santner in the penultimate over. Despite being at the non-striker’s end in the penultimate over, the Kiwi managed to double off the final ball of the 19th over. Earlier, LSG had a strong start with to Mitchell Marsh’s 60 in the powerplay and Aiden Markram’s 50. MI put up a valiant fight in response to Naman Dhir’s and Suryakumar Yadav’s knocks, but Digvesh Rathi’s spell and Avesh Khan’s last over gave Lucknow the victory.
India
