Punjab Kings (PBKS) suffered a 4-wicket defeat at the hands of Rajasthan Royals (RR) on Friday, May 19 in Dharamshala, ending their hopes of playoffs qualification in the ongoing IPL 2023.
RR skipper Sanju Samson won the toss and put PBKS into bat in their final IPL league match. Prabhsimran Singh (9), Shikhar Dhawan (17), and Atharva Taide (19) fell early, but Jitesh Sharma (44), Sam Curran (49*), and Shahrukh Khan (41*) propelled Punjab Kings to 187/5.
In reply, Yashasvi Jaiswal (50) and Devdutt Padikkal (51) kept RR in the hunt despite Jos Buttler (0) and Sanju Samson (2) falling early. After Jaiswal and Padikkal got out, Shimron Hetmyer (46) and Riyan Parag (20 in 12) took over.
Dhruv Jurel then completed the win by hitting Rahul Chahar for a six in the last over.
PBKS had hoped batter Liam Livingstone would help them to a big total. But unlike his previous innings of 94 on the same ground, the Englishman failed to come good.
Livingstone was dismissed for 9 runs off 13 deliveries in match 66 of the IPL 2023 in Dharamsala. He attempted to slog RR pacer Navdeep Saini but was bowled. Following his dismissal, he was spotted wearing a smile on his face, even though his team was in grave trouble at 50/4.
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However, former India player Yusuf Pathan was unhappy with Livingstone smiling after his dismissal and said that if he was a coach or mentor of Punjab and a batter laughed after getting out, he would never play in IPL again.
"If we were coach, captain or mentor of Punjab Kings and you laugh after getting out to that sort of a shot then we will never pick you (to play in IPL) again," Yusuf Pathan said on Star Sports.
Former India spinner Harbhajan Singh agreed with Pathan and was astonished by Livingstone's reaction to his dismissal.
Livingstone had a good IPL 2023, scoring 279 runs in nine matches at an average of 34.88 and a strike rate of 163.16, with two fifties.
