IPL 2025 witnessed its first Super Over on Wednesday (April 16) at the Arun Jaitely Stadium, where Delhi Capitals (DC) emerged as victorious against Rajasthan Royals (RR).
RR tied with DC’s first innings score of 188, before the game went into the Super Over. Nitish Rana was the stand-out batter for the visitors during the run chase, scoring 51 off 28 balls with six boundaries and two sixes.
However, the Royals decided against using Rana’s services in the one-over eliminator. Instead, they sent Riyan Parag, Shimron Hetmyer and Yashasvi Jaiswal.
As it turned out, RR could not even complete the six balls as they lost two wickets and scored 11. The home team successfully chased down the 12-run target, achieving the goal in just four balls with KL Rahul and Tristan Stubbs leading the charge against Sandeep Sharma's bowling.
After the game, Nitish Rana addressed the question about him being not sent to bat for the Super Over.
"The management takes the call, not one person. The captain is there along with two other senior players and coaches. If Shimron Hetmyer had hit two sixes, then you wouldn't be asking this question. I will give the same answer. I don't have any other answer. Whatever decisions we took was absolutely right. Hetmyer is our finisher, that everyone knows. He has delivered in the past," Rana said in the press-match presser.
"One person never takes such calls. Management and support staff is there to discuss such things. If the decision was in our favour then your question would have been different. Cricket is a result-oriented sport. If Sandeep Sharma had bowled well in the Super Over, which he has done in the past. In this situation, he was most likely the bowler for us. We were one big shot less. We were targeting 15 runs in the Super Over."
Mitchell Starc starred with the ball in DC’s thrilling win over RR. The left-arm quick delivered a phenomenal last over for the Capitals when the Royals needed nine runs to win. He used all his experience bowling against Hetmyer and Dhruv Jurel and managed to push the game into the Super Over, conceding just eight runs.
After returning with the figures of 1/36 in four overs, Starc gave away 11 runs in the Super Over as DC registered their fifth victory of the season in six matches.
