Watch: Nicholas Pooran smashes Rashid Khan for successive sixes during LSG vs GT clash in IPL 2026

The Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) have a decent start to the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2026 campaign as they completed two successive victories before facing the Gujarat Titans (GT) at the Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Stadium in Lucknow. But their concern was around their middle-order’s batting performance.

Lucknow invested so much in Nicholas Pooran, the former West Indies captain, who can go after the spinners in the middle overs. But since retiring from the shortest format, he hasn’t looked like the same bowler and has struggled to find rhythm with the bat to put the opposition under pressure. 

Nicholas Pooran smacks Rashid Khan for two consecutive sixes

At the start of the 14th over, Pooran was on six runs off 13 balls and didn’t hit a single boundary. The left-handed batter was struggling even to get the singles when the field was wide open. GT captain, Shubman Gill, found the situation suitable to bring back Rashid Khan into the attack.

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Pooran leaned across defensively against the first tossed-up ball of the over. On the second delivery of the over, the leg spinner kept tossing it in the air as the southpaw didn’t back away and went hard to slice it with a lofted drive. The ball went high in the air and crossed the boundary rope, despite keeping the fielder interested.

He continued the dominance with another six as the batter leaned forward and sliced it with another drive. This time, the power came into the equation as the ball sailed high and over the long-off region for a massive six. Pooran got the six despite not spotting the ball early off Rashid’s hand.

Gujarat Titans make defensive start in 165-run chase

Both the GT openers, Sai Sudharsan and Shubman Gill, were defensive in the first four overs of the chase with just 25 runs on the board. But most importantly, they didn’t lose any wickets, which would put pressure on Rishabh Pant to bring his main bowlers back into the attack.

See Also: Watch: Mohammad Siraj removes Rishabh Pant in IPL 2026

Earlier, Lucknow finished their allotted 20 overs with 164 runs for the loss of eight wickets. Most of their batters got the starts and converted the scores into double figures. But none of them was able to get to the half-century as they finished with 164/8. Prasidh Krishna was excellent for his four wickets in four overs at an economy rate of just seven.

Brief Scores (at the time of writing): GT- 128/1 (S Gill 56, J Buttler 55, D Rathi 1/31) vs LSG 164/8 (A Markram 30, P Krishna 4/28) 

Fans react to Pooran’s two sixes against Rashid in IPL 2026

Here is how the fans have reacted to Pooran’s two successive sixes against Rashid in IPL 2026-