Karun Nair earned a place in the history books after his ruthless blitzkrieg against Mumbai Indians in the ongoing edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 at Delhi Capitals’ home ground on Sunday. Karun made everybody remember the reason behind Arun Jaitley Stadium’s reputation as a high-scoring venue. The venue’s shorter boundaries and placid batting strip make it a batting heaven, and Karun made the most of the conditions.
During Delhi’s pursuit of a daunting 206-run target, the hosts lost their misfiring opener, Jake Fraser-McGurk, early into the chase. Karun was brought in as an impact substitute and he certainly influenced the flow of the game.
He pulled out a wide array of shots from his loaded arsenal and swayed the momentum in Delhi’s favour. He went berserk in the powerplay by exploiting the turf and smacking anything that came his way, irrespective of the stature of the bowler. With his swashbuckling display with the bat, Karun became just the second player for Delhi to hammer a 50-plus score in the powerplay of an IPL match. The young Australian Fraser-McGurk is the only player to achieve the feat, and he has done it twice in the last edition of the cash-rich league.
Karun raced to his 50 in a mere 22 deliveries, and the majority of bashing he handed to was Mumbai’s prime weapon, Jasprit Bumrah. Considered to be the best pacer in the world in the present scenario, Karun read him like a book. Nair hit him three fours and two sixes in the space of eight balls.
He effortlessly muscled the ball past the boundary rope, and it was the final over of the powerplay where Karun truly flaunted his boundary-hitting muscle. He began the over by smoking the ball past the boundary rope for a maximum. He topped it up by dispatching the ball for a boundary on the third delivery.
On the penultimate delivery of the over, he picked up the slower delivery and lofted it over long-off for another maximum. With a double on the final ball, Karun completed his half-century by garnering 18 runs from the over.
He became the third batter to score the most runs in Bumrah’s over in the IPL after Pat Cummins and DJ Bravo. Overall, Karun was the reason behind Bumrah’s dismay as overall, he hammered 26 runs from nine deliveries, the second-highest by any Indian player in an IPL match.
When asked about his striking against Jasprit Bumrah, Nair said, “It was about picking the right balls and playing to the areas that I wanted to play. He is the best bowler at the moment in world cricket. So, I had to be very watchful of where he was going to bowl. But again, I just backed myself and backed the areas that I wanted to score.”
The average Delhi vs Mumbai debate in comments section
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During his record-scripting run at the crease, Karun forged a 119-run partnership with Abishek Porel, the second-highest stand for 2nd wicket or lower for DC against MI, behind the 154 runs added by JP Duminy and Shreyas Iyer in Delhi in 2015.
Karun’s exploits at the crease came to an end on 89(40), courtesy of a peach of a delivery from Mitchell Santner. The ball zipped past Karun’s outside edge and crashed into the stumps.
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