Who will win IPL 2025?

The betting markets have made their odds, but they could have under-estimated some teams.

There are millions of dollars coming into the markets, letting us know who will win the IPL, or at least who certain people with large bets and small bets think will win. So I wanted to look at each side and work out which odds made sense, and which ones don’t really hold up.

Let's start with Lucknow Super Giants.

What's with all the left-handers? It feels like there's a lot of them. Is it too many? I don't know. Can you have too many left-handers? Perhaps if other teams actually have an offspinner, they can. Their bowling looks an injury away from disaster, and they currently seem to have a lot of injuries.

I don't really understand the makeup of this squad at all. Were they hoping that all the bowlers would stay fit? Because that seems very unlikely. They really have no overseas depth, especially when it comes to bowling, and they have no all-round depth. It's a very confusing setup.

And I have other questions. Do they know who their openers are? And do they have a single wicket-taker on their staff? I suppose Shamar Joseph is, but I can't see him playing in this side. But other than that, do they have anyone who's going to take any wickets? There's lots of questions.

I think 5.4 percent is probably too high. I can see how they win games with Mitchell Marsh, Nicholas Pooran, Rishabh Pant, and David Miller. You can throw in Aiden Markram too, if they can fit him in. But I cannot see how they can win this title. I rate them as the lowest chance of winning at all. Which doesn’t mean they automatically should come last, but if the injuries keep coming, they should actually come last.

Possible XII:

1 Yuvraj Chaudhary/Arshin Kulkarni, 2 Mitchell Marsh*/Aidan Markram, 3 Nicholas Pooran*, 4 Rishabh Pant (capt & wk), 5 Ayush Badoni, 6 David Miller*, 7 Abdul Samad, 8 Shahbaz Ahmed, 9 Rajvardhan Hangargekar, 10 Ravi Bishnoi, 11 Shamar Joseph*, 12 Akash Singh/Prince Yadav

Let’s have a look at Delhi Capitals.

The biggest question has to be: what on earth is KL Rahul going to do? Because around him is actually a little bit of fragility. I like Tristan Stubbs, but they have Jake Fraser-McGurk, or Fragile McGurk, I suppose as he might be now, and Smashutosh. There's every possibility that Rahul just decides to bat slow again. I don't think he will, but maybe?

They hired four fast bowlers, and they kind of only need two of them to work alongside Axar Patel and Kuldeep Yadav for it to be a pretty good team.

There are also question marks over Mitchell Starc’s form and fitness, and over T Natarajan’s fitness. I kind of think as a team they need two plans. One, if Jake ‘Fragile’ McGurk doesn't work. And the other, if Jake ‘Fraggle’ McGurk goes absolutely nuts.

It’s worth mentioning that they also have a young leggie called Vipraj Nigam, who bowls a little bit like a low cost Rashid Khan, and bats a little bit like a discount Wanindu Hasaranga. Seems handy.

They are a 6.5 percent chance, which to me seems about right. I might have them a little bit lower, just because there are so many questions I can't answer. But I think all things considered, that's pretty fair.

Possible XII:

1 Jake Fraser-McGurk*, 2 Faf du Plessis*, 3 KL Rahul (wk), 4 Abishek Porel, 5 Tristan Stubbs*, 6 Axar Patel, 7 Ashutosh Sharma, 8 Sameer Rizvi/Mohit Sharma, 9 Kuldeep Yadav, 10 Mitchell Starc*, 11 T Natarajan, 12 Mukesh Kumar

Punjab Kings are back, and this time they're very different. Ricky Ponting has brought an entire group of small name Aussies with him. How the Aussie coaches like doing that! There is a lot of all-round talent they have, so they can go with some really funky line-ups if they want to.

Their new ball could be a lot of fun. There are some questions on their openers. Priyansh Arya looks fun, as does Suryansh Shedge. So they have a couple of young players that could go either way.

I can't believe I'm saying this out loud, but I really like this mix. To me, 8 percent seems a little bit too low. If they can make their openers work - and that is a big if - this looks like a real side to me.

Of course, working out who you want to be the guys facing the most balls when they start the innings is not a small thing. But this team has an incredible problem-solving ability because they have Glenn Maxwell and Azmatullah Omazai and Marcus Stoinis and Marco Jansen. They could just change their lineups from game to game if they want. It's quite exciting, and it could be a really interesting side to follow.

Possible XII:

1 Prabhsimran Singh/Priyansh Arya, 2 Josh Inglis*, 3 Shreyas lyer (capt), 4 Glenn Maxwell*, 5 Azmatullah Omarzai/Marcus Stoinis*, 6 Shashank Singh, 7 Nehal Wadhera/ Suryansh Shedge, 8 Marco Jansen* Harpreet Brar, 10 Yash Thakur/Lockie Ferguson*, 11 Arshdeep Singh, 12 Yuzvendra Chahal