IPL 2025: From Iyer reviving PBKS' fortunes to Pant and Dhoni's struggles, hits and misses this season

The 18th season of the Indian Premier League (IPL) is well and truly in its final stretch. Seven matches remain in the league phase of the ongoing season, but those won’t have much context other than to decide which teams occupy the top two spots on the table and which one ends up at the bottom of the barrel. The race to the playoffs, after all, concluded with Mumbai Indians' clinical victory over Delhi Capitals on Wednesday, resulting in the Hardik Pandya-led side joining Gujarat Titans, Royal Challengers Bengaluru and Punjab Kings.

It certainly has been a roller-coaster of a season so far, one that got underway on 22 March and would have been over this Sunday had it not been for the mayhem that broke out in South Asia following the deadly terror attack in Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir. The IPL, after all, had to be put on hold for a week due to an armed conflict between India and Pakistan earlier this month, resulting in the league being put on hold only for the second time in its history.

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The season has also had its fair share of highs and lows – both individually as well as when taking team performances into account. Here’s a recap of all the hits and misses so far this season:

Hits: Iyer, youngsters, RCB and more

Rishabh Pant and Shreyas Iyer had become two of the most expensive players in IPL history in the player auction in November after getting acquired for Rs 27 crore and Rs 26.75 crore respectively. However, only one of them has delivered this season – with bat as well as with leadership skills, with Iyer steering Punjab Kings into the IPL playoffs for the first time in 11 years while scoring 435 runs at an average of 48.33 and a strike rate of 174.70 respectively.

The middle-order batter thus highlighted the fact that he deserved as much credit for Kolkata Knight Riders’ triumph last season as mentor Gautam Gambhir, who has since joined the Indian team as their head coach, or coach Chandrakant Pandit and the rest of the team. And the fact that he has reunited with head coach Ricky Ponting, whom he had formed a successful pairing with at Delhi Capitals, has only helped Punjab’s cause.

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Another major talking point this season, and one that has been something of a recurring theme, is how impressive the debutants have been and why the IPL remains a boon for Indian cricket. Bihar batter Vaibhav Suryavanshi became the youngest to play an IPL match after getting included for the home game against Lucknow Super Giants, and ended up hitting his first ball for a six. Two games later, he would smash the fastest IPL century by an Indian and the second-fastest overall with a 35-ball century against Gujarat Titans.

PBKS opener Priyansh Arya has been just as impressive, having struck a 39-ball century against Chennai Super Kings in Mullanpur. And like Suryavanshi, he too has cemented himself at the top of the batting order. MI, meanwhile, have had left-arm pacer Ashwani Kumar and Vignesh Puthur collect four and three wickets respectively on IPL debut. Let’s not forget Chennai Super Kings’ Ayush Mhatre either, who struck 32 off 15 against Mumbai Indians on debut and nearly helped his struggling team defeat Royal Challengers Bengaluru at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium with a valiant 94 off 48.

And speaking of RCB, how can we forget how stellar a job Rajat Patidar has performed in his maiden season as captain of the iconic franchise, following the decision to part ways with Faf du Plessis ahead of the mega auction. The Royal Challengers had snuck into the playoffs last season after a victory over CSK in their final league match, but have looked dominant this year, especially with their 50-run victory at Chepauk – a venue where they had not beaten the Super Kings since the inaugural season in 2008.

Misses: Pant, Dhoni, KKR and more

Coming back to the original point of comparing Iyer and Pant, while one has led his team from the front and has steered a franchise known for being “perennial underachievers” into the playoffs, the other has been a flop with the bat as well as as captain. Not only has Pant endured his worst season with the bat, scoring just 135 runs in 12 outings at an average and strike rate of 12.27 and 100 respectively, his team also became the latest to bow out of the playoffs race on Monday following a six-wicket loss in a must-win game against Sunrisers Hyderabad at home.

Pant has had his highs and lows during his eight-year association with Delhi Capitals, as well as with the Indian team. However, to fail to deliver after being paid what is an astronomical amount in the cricketing world certainly will pinch a lot more than usual.

Pant isn’t the only senior wicketkeeper-batter whose underwhelming performance with the bat has proved to be a major hurdle for his team. The 18th IPL season witnessed MS Dhoni return to captaincy after a season-ending injury to Ruturaj Gaikwad last month.

‘Captain Cool’ however, has scored just 196 runs in 13 outings this season at an average and strike rate of 24.50 and 135.17 respectively so far this year. And what makes those numbers even more worrying is the fact that he has hardly made any contribution in a winning cause, walking out to bat when there only are a few overs left to deal with in an innings even if it means he has to bat as low as No 9.

Dhoni has been struggling with his fitness ever since he underwent a knee surgery in 2023, and the fact that he isn’t able to run around or bat beyond a handful of overs certainly should make the legendary captain and finisher as well as the franchise think if he can continue playing in the IPL at the age of 43.

Another senior Indian player who hardly delivered this season is Mohammed Shami, who was benched by the Sunrisers Hyderabad after collecting just six wickets in nine matches in his first IPL season in two years, averaging more than fifty as a result.

And when speaking of teams that have flopped this season, how can we forget Kolkata Knight Riders and Sunrisers Hyderabad – the two finalists last season who currently are playing for pride, with the former having been knocked out after their match against RCB on Saturday ended in a washout.

The Knight Riders had bought Rahane during the final round of bidding in the mega auction in November and announced him as the captain shortly before the season got underway. And while Rahane has been in a lot better a form compared to other captains such as Pant and Dhoni, scoring 375 runs in 12 appearances this season (ave: 37.50; SR: 146.48).

However, the fact remains that Rahane hasn’t quite been able to recreate the magic Iyer had created with the franchise last year, and the fact that key players like Venkatesh Iyer and Rinku Singh haven’t lived up to their expectations has also affected their fortunes.

In SRH’s case though, they had retained captain Pat Cummins as well as the explosive opening pair of Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma and the middle-order duo of Heinrich Klaasen and Nitish Reddy. Key players have had their moments of brilliance on the field, from Abhishek’s brilliant 141 and his 171-run opening stand with Head against PBKS to Cummins’ three-wicket hauls against DC (3/19) and MI (3/26).

However, the fact remains that the team hardly clicked as a unit this season, and the star names simply failed to deliver when the team needed them the most.

Delhi Capitals did not even make it to the playoffs after being in this position once 😭😭😭😭😭 pic.twitter.com/GkC3hgaNjb

— Ashwin (@ashwin_ro) May 21, 2025

Last, but not the least, Delhi Capitals became the final team to bow out of the race to the playoffs with a 59-run defeat at the hands of Mumbai Indians. This was after they suffered a 10-wicket loss against Gujarat Titans at home to send three teams into the playoffs at once – RCB and PBKS in addition to the Shubman Gill-led side.

Spin-bowling all-rounder Axar Patel couldn’t have asked for a better start to his maiden season as DC captain after succeeding Pant in the role, with the Capitals winning four-out-of-four to sit at the top of the table and appear early favourites for the playoffs.

The 2020 runners-up thus became the first team in IPL history to fail to reach the playoffs after winning their first four games of the season. And looking at everything else that has happened so far this season, that might just be the biggest miss of them all.