Sanju Samson, Rajasthan Royals captain, is in the news. The star wicketkeeper-batter recently had to retire hurt after scoring a quick-fire 31 off just 19 balls during an IPL 2025 match against Delhi Capitals on Wednesday. The match was won by Delhi Capitals in the Super Over, after both teams were tied at 188 after the stipulated 20 overs. In the Super Over, RR left out the in-form Nitish Rana (who scored 51 off 28 balls) and instead sent Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shimron Hetmyer and Riyan Parag.
Now, a video, which has been posted by a social media user, is going viral where the match footage shows RR senior team management including head coach Rahul Dravid, Sairaj Bahutule in a team huddle ahead of the Super Over. Samson can be seen in the same video but he doesn’t indulge with anybody. While it may be a case of the RR captain being tensed or being immersed in his thoughts, several social media users wondered whether there was any rift in the team. In the team huddle one player can be seen saying something to Samson but he walks away.
I knew there was definitely a rift within the setup when there were absolutely no discussions or chat in the dugout before the super over.Everyone was standing quite in a circle in the dugout.Look at Sanju’s hand signal in the first video,he is deliberately ignoring everyone. https://t.co/DfxmlwGgBG pic.twitter.com/688ji3MXrS
— Delhi Capitals Fan (@pantiyerfc) April 17, 2025
Is this the reason why their players never celebrate a wicket,especially those Hetmyer catches on the boundary ?
— Delhi Capitals Fan (@pantiyerfc) April 17, 2025
I believe the issues started from the auction table itself. I don’t think Sanju was happy with the decision of letting Butler go.
— Ashwin M (@Ashwin826) April 17, 2025
At least Sanju would have said a word or two facing him instead of showing a hand gesture while walking away.
— Delhi Capitals Fan (@pantiyerfc) April 18, 2025
One would have expected for Nitish Rana to be one of Rajasthan Royals’ (RR) batting choices for the first Super Over of IPL 2025 against Delhi Capitals at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on Wednesday night.
But to everyone’s surprise, despite making a fluent 51 off 28 balls, Rana wasn’t sent in, as RR preferred Shimron Hetmyer, Riyan Parag and then Yashasvi Jaiswal in the one-over decider. It was a move which didn’t pay off as RR made only 11 runs off five balls, including run-outs on last two balls.
At the conclusion of the dramatic game, Rana said all the calls related to on-field decision making are at the hands of the team management. “This is never the decision of one person. It’s always the management, and the support staff, as they can discuss and take a decision on these things. I feel that if this result was in our favour, then the question would have been different. So, this game of cricket is a result-oriented game.
“Management is the one who decides. There are two senior players and the captain. I think, that decision was right. If Hetmyer had hit two sixes, you wouldn’t have asked the same question.
“Hetmyer is our finisher. Everyone knows this, and he has delivered in the past. There are a lot of things that we could have squeezed a little more, and the tied game from that one run shouldn’t have happened. But this is the result,” said Rana in the post-match press conference.
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