When Hardik Pandya entered Mumbai Indians from Gujarat Titans, there were speculations that Pandya would be the next captain of Mumbai. Now this has also been officially announced. Mumbai Indians have issued a statement saying that Hardik Pandya will captain Mumbai Indians in IPL 2024. This decision may not have been easy for Mumbai Indians, but to make a change in their team which has not won the title in the last three seasons, this franchise finally had to do something new.
The last three seasons were bad
Mumbai Indians last won the IPL title in 2020. After this, it could not even qualify for the playoffs in the years 2021 and 2022. In 2022, the situation was such that this team was at 10th position i.e. the last position in the points table. Even in 2023, this team somehow qualified for the playoffs but could not reach the finals.
Rohit Sharma’s bad captaincy phase
In the last three IPL seasons, Rohit Sharma’s captaincy was not visible due to which he was giving back-to-back titles to Mumbai. Apart from this, even at the international level, after becoming the captain of the Indian team, Rohit Sharma played three ICC events and the Indian team could not win the title in all three. Rohit’s recent captaincy record for the country and the franchise has been really weak in the last two or three years. This is a big reason why Mumbai decided to remove Rohit.
Why was Hardik Pandya Chosen As Mumbai Indians’ Captain?
Hardik Pandya made Gujarat Titans the champion as soon as he became the captain for the first time in IPL. In the second season also he took his team to the finals. Under his captaincy, Gujarat Titans performed well regularly. Then in T20 International also, he captained the Indian team and led it to victory in back-to-back series. In such a situation, there could not have been a better replacement for Rohit Sharma for Mumbai Indians.