In the 13th match of the ongoing IPL, visiting team Punjab Kings thrashed hosts Lucknow Super Giants by 8 wickets with 22 balls to spare on Tuesday in Lucknow. With the defeat, LSG became the third team after Kolkata Knight Riders and Chennai Super Kings to cop a loss at home ground. Speaking after the defeat, LSG mentor Zaheer Khan said that pitch didn’t work out in favour of the home team.
"What was a little disappointing for me here, considering it's a home game. In IPL, you've seen how teams have looked at taking a little bit of home advantage, you know, so yeah, from that point of view, you've seen the curator is not really thinking that it's a home game, you know. I think maybe it looked like, you know, it was Punjab curator out here,” Zaheer Khan said during the post-match press conference.
"That's something which we'll figure out. It's a new setup for me also here. But I hope that this is the first and the last game when it comes to that, because you are disappointing the Lucknow fans as well. They've come up with so much expectations of winning the first home game here.
"As a team, we are confident, you know, we accept that we've lost the game, and we're going to do whatever it takes to make that impact in the home leg. We still have six more games to go here."
In the match, Punjab Kings’ skipper Shreyas Iyer (52*) and Prabhsimran Singh (69) plundered half-centuries, helping the side chase LSG's 7-171 with utmost ease.