Mumbai Indians’ journey in the IPL 2024 is over. The Hardik Pandya-led side will be playing Lucknow Super Giants on Friday in their final league game this season, which has been a forgettable one for the five-time champions. Since the time Pandya took over MI’s captaincy, replacing Rohit Sharma, it seemed like everything went downhill. The move came under severe criticism. And then, when MI’s poor form started with a string of losses, Pandya felt the music.
He got criticised for his on-field inconsistent form while the fans booed him too. He found little open support, but Virat Kohli was an exception. He asked the crowd to not boo Pandya in one of the matches. A new video has come where it clearly shows that Kohli is telling the crowd that Pandya is an Indian player.
Kohli Saab. Leader. King. Team man. pic.twitter.com/vOAJXH84pD
— AGirlHasNoName2.0 (@KPN1790) May 16, 2024
Hardik’s performance this season has been mediocre to say the least.
In 13 games, he has scored 200 runs at a strike-rate of 144.93, while also taking 11 wickets in 13 matches at an economy of 10.59. Most of his good bowling performances have come in the latter half of the tournament.
However, Hardik was still picked by the selectors in the 15-man squad for the upcoming T20 World Cup in the Americas.
A report had recently claimed that neither Rohit nor the selection committee, led by former India pacer Ajit Agarkar, was in favour of selecting Hardik.
But, the report said that Hardik was picked in the team under ‘pressure’. The report did not mention whether it was a situational pressure (as he is India’s top fast bowling allrounder) or a pressure from some quarters. The report also attributed sources as saying that captain Rohit Sharma , BCCI chief selector Ajit Agarkar and some selectors were against Pandya’s selection in the T20 World Cup team, during the selection meeting in Ahmedabad.
The report, published by Dainik Jagran, also added that Rohit might retire from the T20 format after the World Cup.
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