New Delhi [India], April 14: Delhi Capitals (DC) captain Axar Patel has been fined ₹12 lakh for maintaining a slow over-rate during his team’s IPL 2025 clash against the Mumbai Indians (MI) at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in Delhi on Sunday.
The fine was imposed under Article 2.2 of the IPL Code of Conduct, which addresses minimum over-rate offences. This was DC’s first such offence of the season, as reported by ESPNcricinfo.
Despite a sensational 89-run knock by Karun Nair on his return to the IPL, Delhi Capitals suffered a heartbreaking 12-run loss, breaking their four-match winning streak. A dramatic batting collapse, including a rare hat-trick of run-outs, derailed DC’s chase of MI’s 206-run target.
The defeat pushed Delhi to second place on the points table, while MI climbed to seventh with two wins and four losses.
Speaking after the match, Axar Patel admitted that the game was within their control:
“We had the game in the bag. Some soft dismissals and bad shots in the middle order. You can’t leave it to the batters in the lower order every time… Don’t need to overthink, just one of those days,” he said.
Patel acknowledged that the conditions were favorable, especially with dew aiding batting in the second innings. He praised Kuldeep Yadav’s current form and urged his team to move past the loss:
“Need to forget this game from a batting point of view,” he added.
In the first innings, Tilak Varma’s half-century and quick-fire knocks from Suryakumar Yadav and Naman Dhir helped MI post 205/5 in their 20 overs.
DC’s chase got off to a disastrous start with Jake Fraser-McGurk falling for a golden duck, caught by Will Jacks off Deepak Chahar. While Abishek Porel managed 33 runs, most of the batting order crumbled under pressure.
A chaotic ending saw three players dismissed through run-outs, the final one being Mohit Sharma, sealing a tense 12-run victory for Mumbai.
With the IPL 2025 heating up, Delhi Capitals will look to bounce back in their next outing, while Mumbai Indians hope to build on this morale-boosting win.