On The Field, Hes…: Abhishek Porel Opens Up On Axar Patels Captaincy For Delhi Capitals In IPL 2025-OxBig News Network

Young Abhishek Porel is enjoying his time at Delhi Capitals under Axar Patel’s captaincy and also thanked elder statesman KL Rahul for putting an arm around his shoulder after he missed a catch during the Sunrisers Hyderabad innings. 

However Porel, who was the uncapped retention for Delhi Capitals this year, did his bit with an impressive 34 not out off 18 balls during his team’s successful chase against SRH in an IPL match here on Sunday.

Having played alongside Axar during the last two seasons, Porel has started to understand his new skipper better.

“Off the field, he’s very funny. On the field, he’s also a very motivated guy. Overall, the captaincy was really good. I really enjoyed playing under his captaincy,” Porel said at the post-match press conference.

Porel played purely as a batter as senior player KL Rahul returned to the set-up after a one-game paternity break. In fact, Porel was feeling a bit down when he dropped Aniket Verma but Rahul told him to forget the blip.

“KL Bhai is like a big brother. He supported me when I dropped the catch (Aniket). He said, ‘no worries’. While batting, he said play your natural shots,” Porel said.

Being an experienced glovesman, Rahul read the wicket well and also gave him insights as to how the pitch was behaving.

“After the first innings, he knew how the pitch was behaving. He really backed me.”

He praised the Visakhapatnam track. ”It was really good. We had home matches last year as well. This year as well, the wicket is good.”