The Fall And Fall Of Rishabh Pant: IPL's Rs 27 Crore Star Showing Why Ajit Agarkar Doesn't Trust Him In T20Is

"Mahi, Rohit, Rishabh" - that was the legacy that Sanjiv Goenka had foreseen for his Rs 27 crore star after the IPL 2025 auction. A place alongside the IPL's most successful captains. A place alongside two of India's greatest white-ball players. When it had been revealed that Rishabh Pant was going to feature in the mega auction, he was unanimously expected to be the most expensive buy. After all, he was India's starting wicket-keeper in a T20 World Cup triumph and the poster boy of fearless cricket.

Yet, just one and a half years into the Lucknow Super Giants project, everything seems to be falling apart for Rishabh Pant. To such an extent, that a premature end to his white-ball career is no longer out of the question.

The Damning Reality

Rishabh Pant averages just 20.8 after his first 21 games in LSG colours. Take out his scintillating innings of 118* in an inconsequential league match in IPL 2025, and that average drops to 15.7.

These are bewildering stats for any top batter, let alone someone who is regarded as one of the most talented batters of his generation, and especially so for someone whose flamboyant batting is the reason why he is already considered by many to be his nation's greatest-ever Test wicket-keeper batter.

But the reality for Rishabh Pant in white-ball cricket could not be a bigger difference to his Test career. He has not played a single T20I since July 2024, nor a single ODI since August 2024. He did not make it into Ajit Agarkar's plans for the T20 World Cup 2026 squad, and it is certainly not out of the question that he does not even make it into the selectors' minds when the 15-man Cricket World Cup 2027 squad is picked.

Steep Competition

The plethora of wicket-keeper batters in India for white-ball cricket is particularly staggering. KL Rahul and Sanju Samson have the positions on lock for now in ODIs and T20Is respectively.

Ishan Kishan has roared back into the form and forced himself into the playing XI in T20Is, and could well be seen as a candidate for ODIs once again.

Jitesh Sharma and Dhruv Jurel continue to wait on the wings, impressing continuously in domestic cricket and the IPL. Jitesh was unlucky to miss out on India's T20 World Cup 2026 squad, while 25-year-old Jurel is fast improving his skills across a variety of batting positions.

Even without taking into account the untapped potential of talents like Kartik Sharma or Mukul Choudhary, Rishabh Pant arguably finds himself behind five wicket-keepers in white-ball cricket already, particularly in T20Is. And given his form with the bat of late, it is hard to argue that the Ajit Agarkar-led BCCI selection committee is making an error.

The LSG Failure

Pant's project at Lucknow Super Giants could not have unravelled much worse. He has been entrusted with captaincy at a franchise that boasts two T20I skippers in Aiden Markram and Mitchell Marsh, but has not managed to yield great results.

LSG have won just 8 out of 21 games under Pant's leadership. The team sits one spot above the wooden spot in the IPL 2026 points table, at the time of writing

Add to that his batting struggles. Pant appears to lack confidence far too many times when batting for LSG, and the free-flowing and unorthodox shot-making he shows in Test cricket is often absent in the IPL.

It is hard to say whether he has failed to progress as a white-ball batter or is suffering from the pressures of captaincy and price tag, but it is easy to conclude that his diminishing white-ball career has directly coincided with his problems at LSG.

As it stands, matching Mahendra Singh Dhoni or Rohit Sharma's legacy, both in the IPL and for India in white-ball cricket, is a distant, distant reality.

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