The one news that has been making the headlines in Indian cricket since Friday is the appointment of Hardik Pandya as the new Mumba Indians captain in place of Rohit Sharma. While Hardik Pandya has earlier led Gujarat Titans to two successive IPL finals, winning one of them, Rohit Sharma has been one of the most successful captains in the history of the T20 franchise league. Rohit Sharma commands a huge fan following and his removal as the skipper was met with some strong reactions from Mumbai Indian supporters.
Now, a new report has claimed that Rohit Sharma was informed about the need of change in Mumbai Indians captaincy around the start of the ODI Cricket World Cup 2023, which began in the first week of October. According to the report in Indian Express, Rohit Sharma agreed to play under Hardik Pandya in IPL 2024.
Hardik Pandya, who had left Mumbai Indians to join Gujarat Titans in 2022, was bought back ahead of the IPL 2024. The report claimed that Hardik Pandya’s condition was that he would return to Mumbai Indians if he is made the captain. The MI management then decided on the way forward and made Rohit Sharma aware of their decision.
Mumbai Indians (MI) on Friday named Hardik Pandya as their captain ahead of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024. Hardik replaced a highly-successful Rohit Sharma, who led the IPL giants to five trophies. The announcement from Mumbai Indians came after Hardik made a return to the franchise last month, following a high-profile trade from Gujarat Titans, whom he led in the past two seasons. After announcing the news of the captaincy change, MI put a heartfelt post on social media for Rohit.
“Ro, In 2013 you took over as captain of MI. You asked us to Believe. In victories & defeats, you asked us to Smile. 10 years & 6 trophies later, here we are. Our forever captain your legacy will be etched in Blue & Gold. Thank you, Captain RO,” wrote MI on X, formerly Twitter.
Earlier in a statement on Friday, Mumbai Indians said the change in leadership was part of their future planning and thanked Rohit for his exemplary service to the franchise.
Mumbai Indians are the most successful IPL franchise alongside Chennai Super Kings who both have won five titles each.
Rohit, who recently led India to the ODI World Cup final, had been captaining the franchise since 2013 when they lifted first of their five IPL trophies.
The other titles under Rohit’s captaincy came in 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2020. Mumbai Indians had made it to the play-offs in IPL 2023.
“We express our gratitude to Rohit Sharma for his exceptional leadership; his tenure as the captain of the Mumbai Indians since 2013 has been nothing short of extraordinary,” said Mahela Jayawardene, MI’s Global Head of Performance.
With PTI inputs
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