Lucknow: Punjab Kings captain Shreyas Iyer became the fourth skipper in Indian Premier League history to score a century while chasing. He joined Virender Sehwag, Virat Kohli and Sanju Samson on the list after making an unbeaten 101 off 51 balls against Lucknow Super Giants. The innings featured 11 fours and five sixes at a strike rate of 198.04.
Earlier captains to achieve the feat were Sehwag with 119 against Deccan Chargers in 2011, Kohli with 108 not out against Rising Pune Supergiant in 2016 and Samson with 119 against Punjab Kings in 2021. Iyer also became the third Punjab Kings captain to score an IPL hundred, following KL Rahul and Adam Gilchrist.
With the knock, Iyer reached 7,000 career T20 runs. Across 254 matches he has 7,076 runs at an average of 35.02 and strike rate above 135, including four centuries and 48 fifties. In the current IPL season he has 498 runs in 13 innings at 55.33 with a strike rate of 168.01.
Punjab Kings chose to bowl first and restricted Lucknow Super Giants to 196 for six. Josh Inglis made 72, Ayush Badoni 43 and Abdul Samad an unbeaten 37. Yuzvendra Chahal and Marco Jansen each took two wickets.
Iyer and Prabhsimran Singh, who scored 69, guided Punjab Kings to victory with seven wickets and two overs remaining, ending a six-match losing streak. The team moved to fourth place with 15 points.
