The former England captain Michael Vaughan took a playful dig on Lucknow Super Giants’ strategic timeout in the IPL 2025 season despite needing two runs off 24 balls against Sunrisers Hyderabad.

Michael Vaughan took ‘X’ he wrote, “Only in the IPL can you have a strategic timeout with 2 needed off 24 balls with 5 wickets remaining. #India”, followed by a teasing emoji.

The timeout is usually taken to discuss tactical adjustments or break the opposition’s momentum, which appeared redundant given the match situation.

With LSG comfortably cruising to victory, many fans and experts found the decision puzzling, making it a perfect moment for Michael Vaughan’s trademark sarcasm.

As far as the rules are concerned, each team gets one three-minute strategic timeout per inning, bowling teams between overs 6-9 and batting teams between overs 13-16. If a team hasn’t taken its strategic timeout before the 16th over, it is automatically enforced after that over.

Before this unusal timeout became a talking point, the match itself had plenty of fireworks. LSG’s Shardul Thakur produced a masterclass in pace bowling, dismantling SRH’s top order with figures of 4/34.

Lucknow Super Giants won the toss and opted to field first. Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma opened the inning for SRH while Shardul Thakur opened the bowling attack.

Thakur in his next over, made a massive turn by dismissing Abhishek Sharma and Ishan Kishan in back-to-back deliveries. Though SRH lost a couple of early wickets, Travis Head continued his aggression and dragged SRH to score 62 runs for 2 wickets loss at the end of six overs.

While Travis Head seems dangerous, Prince Yadav in the third delivery of the 8th over, dismissed Head for 47 runs and turned things in favour of LSG. With Nitish Kumar Reddy’s steady inning, SRH scored 96 runs for 3 wickets at the end of 10 overs.

In the final delivery of the 12th over, Heinrich Klaasen lost his wicket in an unfortunate runout dismissal while scoring 26 runs off 17 balls.

Nitish Reddy who scored some runs in the middle overs fell to Ravi Bishnoi’s spin attack and lost his wicket with a score of 32 runs. With Aniket Verma and Cummins sixes, SRH scored 190 runs for 9 wickets loss at the end of 20 overs.

On the other hand, LSG opening batter Aiden Markram lost his wicket after scoring just one run. But Nicholas Pooran’s aggressive knock dragged Lucknow to score 77 runs for a wicket at the end of the first powerplay.

While Pooran scored 70 runs, Cummins trapped him in front and put an end to Pooran’s aggressive knock. With a steady knock from Marsh and Pant, Lucknow managed to score 129 runs for 2 wickets at the end of 10 overs.

Cummins in the 11th over, dismissed Mitchell Marsh who scored his second consecutive half-century in IPL 2025. Ayush Badoni and Pant returned pavilion with a score of 6 and 15 respectively while LSG managed to score 176 runs for five wickets at the end of 15 overs.

With Abdul Samad‘s quickfire eight-ball 22 runs, Lucknow won the game by five wickets with Shardul Thakur winning the Player of the Match Award for his impressive blowing spell.