Rishabh Pant's 'I'm the 13th because of Impact Player...' tweet leaves fans misty-eyed ahead of DC vs LSG match
Rishabh Pant posted a tweet tagging Delhi Capitals hours before the side's opening match of IPL 2023 against Lucknow Super Giants.
The Delhi Capitals will begin their 2023 Indian Premier League campaign on Saturday when they take on the Lucknow Super Giants in Lucknow. The Capitals are led by David Warner in the absence of Rishabh Pant, who remains unavailable for the season as he continues to recover from injuries sustained in a car crash. Pant survived a severe accident last December but has since been away from action, and could miss a large part of India's cricketing calendar this year.
The Capitals announced Warner as their captain earlier this month, with spinner Axar Patel as his deputy. Ahead of their season opener on Saturday, the Capitals posted a tweet asking fans to name their DC XI against Lucknow Super Giants. And Pant, taking to his official Twitter account, had a heartwarming response that had fans cheering for him on the social media platform.
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Pant wrote, “I am 13th player coz of impact rule otherwise would have been 12th man.”
Pant was named the captain of Delhi Capitals during the 2021 season of the IPL, and had steered the side to the playoffs of the tournament. The side had finished at the top of the table with 10 wins in 14 matches, but faced defeats to Chennai Super Kings (Qualifier 1) and the Kolkata Knight Riders (Eliminator) to bow out of the season.
Warner, meanwhile, made a return to the Capitals last season and enjoyed an impressive outing with the franchise, scoring 432 runs in 12 matches at a brilliant strike rate of 150.52. He smashed five half-centuries throughout the season but the Capitals narrowly missed out on a playoff spot, finishing fifth in the table.
The Capitals will be hoping for a stronger season in 2023; the side bolstered its squad with the signing of South Africa's aggressive bater Rilee Rossouw, England's Philip Salt and senior Indian batter Manish Pandey. The franchise did draw some attention when it broke the bank for uncapped Indian pacer Mukesh Kumar, whom it bought for INR 5.5 crore.
