Punjab Kings' skipper Shreyas Iyer on Monday thanked head coach Ricky Ponting for giving him the "freedom to go out and express myself" as the side sealed a spot in the Qualifier 1 of IPL 2025 with a convincing seven-wicket win over Mumbai Indians here.
Iyer joined PBKS after guiding Kolkata Knight Riders to their third IPL title last season, and he made an instant impact, guiding the Punjab outfit to its first-ever playoffs since 2014.
"The camaraderie has been there for the past few years between Ricky and I, he gives me a lot of freedom. He lets me be decisive on the field, all these things have culminated in a great way," Iyer said at the post-match presentation ceremony.
"Every individual stepped up at the right time. Starting from game one, we've been in the mindset of wanting to win despite the situation. We've had players putting their hands up when we were in the dumps. Kudos to support staff and management too.
"Ricky has been fantastic with player management; it's important for me to get trust too. That happened with the wins early on. Had conversations with them too. You have to maintain good relationships throughout. I feel the dressing room has been top notch throughout. When you are down in the dumps, it is easy to backstab each other," he added.
Iyer also lauded Priyansh Arya (62 off 35 balls) and Josh Inglis (73 off 42) for their brilliant knocks.
"The way Priyansh started was fabulous; young players are fearless. They tick the boxes in the nets; the effects of the prep is now showing on the field.
"Inglis is the only player whose position has been chopping and changing. Since he loves playing the new ball, I wanted him to play more deliveries. It worked wonders. We know he's destructive and a big-match player with a great attitude," he said.
MI skipper Hardik Pandya believed they were 20 runs short of what could have been a winning score.
"The way the wicket played, we were definitely 20 runs short. That happens, we've been playing really good cricket, we couldn't play our best cricket.
"We were definitely 20 runs short. We could have capitalised either at the start or in the middle; we'll figure it out," he said.
Pandya said it was a wake-up call for MI before they head into the playoffs.
"IPL is like that; this franchise has won five trophies, and it has always been tough. Anytime you take your leg off the accelerator, the other teams are also keen to win. The message would be simple: This was just a blip; learn from this and look forward to the knockouts," he said.
He said MI's bowling unit was not clinical on Monday.
"They really took on certain balls whenever we erred, and I don't think as a bowling unit we were clinical; we gave some balls that they really capitalised and at certain times, they played some good shots as well.
"Overall, we were not up to the mark."