"The problems were seen mounting" - Aakash Chopra on Punjab Kings' early loss of Mayank Agarwal and Jonny Bairstow

Former Indian batter Aakash Chopra has highlighted that Liam Livingstone's knock helped the Punjab Kings (PBKS) recover from a poor start to set a challenging target for the Gujarat Titans (GT) in last night's IPL 2022 encounter.

Livingstone walked out to bat in the fifth over when the Kings had already lost Mayank Agarwal and Jonny Bairstow. The England all-rounder smashed 64 runs off just 27 balls to help the IPL 2014 finalists set a challenging 190-run target for the Titans.

While reviewing the match in a video shared on his YouTube channel, Aakash Chopra pointed out that the Punjab Kings were in a spot of bother early in their innings. He explained:

"Mayank Agarwal is still not scoring runs. He gets dismissed by a Hardik Pandya bouncer this time. Shikhar Dhawan was batting well. Jonny Bairstow came and went, he did not score runs. Lockie Ferguson threatened and scared Jonny Bairstow to get him out and the problems were seen mounting."

The former Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) player lauded Livingstone for taking the attack to the Gujarat Titans bowlers. Chopra elaborated:

"Then Liam Livingstone comes to bat, how well does he hit. He was caught on the boundary once, Hardik's foot touched the skirting. Otherwise, the sixes he hits - he hits 110m sixes, it was unbelievable hitting and against this bowling which has a lot of might. I see the Gujarat Titans as the best bowling lineup of the entire tournament but when Liam Livingstone was hitting it seemed that this team's bowling is good but the might is not being seen."

Livingstone smoked seven fours and four sixes as he scored his runs at a strike rate of 237.03. It looked like the Mayank Agarwal-led side would easily cross the 200-run mark when the big-hitter was smashing boundaries all around the park.

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"Punjab Kings have come with the thinking of all or nothing" - Aakash Chopra

The Punjab Kings lost a plethora of wickets after the 13th over of their innings [P/C: iplt20.com]

Aakash Chopra highlighted that the Punjab Kings' propensity to bat ultra-aggressively led to a flurry of wickets. He observed:

"There was a sudden collapse because everyone was hitting. Punjab Kings have come with the thinking of all or nothing, either 200 or 120. Jitesh Sharma came and hit sixes, Shahrukh Khan also hit, they lost two wickets in an over twice - once off Darshan Nalkande and then Rashid Khan."

The renowned commentator added that the Kings were only able to post a fighting total because of an unbroken 27-run partnership for the last wicket. Chopra said:

"In the end, there was a 25-run partnership for the tenth wicket, then you crossed the 180-run mark, where Arshdeep and Rahul Chahar play and you got something to fight."

Rahul Chahar (22 runs off 14 balls) and Arshdeep Singh (10 runs off five deliveries) helped the Punjab Kings reach a score of 189/9. However, the Titans overhauled their score off the very last delivery, with Rahul Tewatia smoking a couple of sixes when 12 runs were required off the last two balls.