Hardik penalised for MI's slow over-rate against Gujarat Titans

Hardik Pandya, the Mumbai Indians (MI) captain, has been fined INR 12 lakh for his team's slow over-rate during the IPL 2025 game against Gujarat Titans (GT) on Saturday night in Ahmedabad.

This was MI's second game - and second defeat - of the season, but Hardik's first appearance, after he had to serve a ban for MI's season-opener. That was a punishment for MI's slow over-rate in the last game of IPL 2024, against Lucknow Super Giants (LSG). Fortunately for MI and Hardik, the latest offence will not lead to a ban, since the IPL has done away with that rule and now, for such offences, there are only fines and in-game field restrictions.

This was the first slow over-rate penalty in IPL 2025 and came after the ninth game of the season.

MI, bowling with four quick bowlers - Trent Boult, Deepak Chahar, Satyanarayana Raju and Hardik himself - overshot the stipulated time to complete their overs as GT scored 196 for 8. MI couldn't quite get the chase off the ground, stopping at 160 for 6.

This came after Suryakumar Yadav led MI to a loss in their opening game, away in Chennai against Chennai Super Kings (CSK). On that occasion, MI were asked to bat first, and were restricted to 155 for 9, with Noor Ahmad picking up four wickets, his 4 for 18 still the best figures in the competition so far. CSK got past the target in the final over, winning by four wickets.