Hyderabad (Telangana) [India], May 7 (ANI): Punjab Kings suffered their third defeat on the trot in IPL 2026 when they failed to chase down a 236-run target against Sunrisers Hyderabad on Wednesday despite an unbeaten ton by Cooper Connolly.
Playing just his 10th IPL match, Connolly hit his maiden T20 century at Uppal Stadium in Hyderabad, but could not take his side past the winning line. The 22-year-old also became the youngest overseas batter to hit an IPL century.
He made 107 not out off 59 balls with the help of seven fours and eight sixes. He has made 377 runs for PBKS and is the leading run-scorer for the franchise so far.
PBKS spin bowling coach Sairaj Bahutule praised Connolly for his historic ton and called him a ‘team man’. Speaking during the post-match press conference, Bahutule said, “He’s a great potential, definitely. He’ll play a long period for Australia; he’s a very good all-rounder in the making and a fabulous fielder. He’s got a good head on his shoulder, and he’s a very sort of a team man. Like for today’s conditions, I can say that in spite of the fact that we knew at some stage it was a losing cause, but he just made sure that the momentum is on and sees how we can get closer to the total because obviously things like these also help us in our net run rate, so that’s what he did beautifully. He’s learning to be in India and playing in the conditions, and the way he has adopted as an overseas player has been fabulous to see at that age. To come and play in different venues, different pitches and perform so well. So, I think he’s got a good future ahead of him.”
Punjab Kings’ fielders dropped a lot of catches, and Bahutule called them out as the main cause of losing the match.
Punjab Kings won the toss and opted to bowl first. While Travis Head (38) and Abhishek Sharma (35) gave SRH a brilliant start, PBKS did have a chance to pull things back as they had reduced the opposition to 86/2 in 7 overs. However, their fielders dropped catches that proved costly for them.
SRH posted a massive 235/4, powered by fifties from Heinrich Klaasen (69*) and Ishan Kishan (55), along with quick starts from Head and Abhishek. Chahal was the only bowler who stood out for PBKS with the figures of 1/32 in 4 overs.
Talking about what went wrong for PBKS, Bahutule said, “Definitely we had our plans in terms of all the top three batters for SRH, and they are the batters who’ve been really scoring highly for the team, and it was very important for us to execute our plans, and we did execute them, but unfortunately, catches were dropped, and I think that hurt us.”
“I think it was very important to take those catches because there are such players that if you tend to drop catches, they will score and score quickly. So, I think definitely catching could have changed the momentum of the game. There would have been fresh batters on the ground on the pitch, and we could have executed our plans more effectively and then ended up maybe giving more than you know 50 runs less,” he added.
Coming to SRH’s bowling, Pat Cummins rotated his bowlers effectively to ensure PBKS never gained the momentum needed for a miracle. Cummins (2/34), Shivang Kumar (2/45), Sakib Hussain (1/40) and Nitish Kumar Reddy (1/11 in 2 overs) were the wicket takers for the hosts. (ANI)