What Led To Mumbai Indians’ Captain Change From Rohit Sharma to Hardik Pandya?

What Led To Mumbai Indians’ Captain Change From Rohit Sharma to Hardik Pandya: The Mumbai Indians, five-time Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 winners, shocked the cricket world by announcing that Hardik Pandya will take Rohit Sharma’s position as captain. When MI chose to move Cameron Green to Royal Challengers Bangalore, the all-round player came from Gujarat Titans as part of a transaction.

But, little did fans know that the trade from GT wasn’t in the capacity of a player but also a ‘captain’. However, what caused this shift in the position of leadership?

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Hardik Pandya, a player who guided Gujarat Titans to two straight IPL finals and won one of them, took the position of Rohit Sharma, the guy who guided Mumbai Indians to five IPL victories in ten years.

The action suggests a significant shift in Rohit’s circumstances, given that his position as captain of India’s white-ball teams has also been called into doubt since the 2023 Cricket World Cup ended.

Even though Rohit had a fantastic World Cup for cricket, he hasn’t played well for MI in the past several years. He scored 268 runs in 14 games during the IPL 2022 season, with an average of 19.14, and 332 runs in 16 games, with an average of 20.75, during the 2023 season.

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Even though it’s hard to argue that Rohit’s performance suffered as captain, MI failed to take significant action that would have allowed them to contend for the championship in the future.

The Mumbai Indians have to outline their future intentions with only one season remaining before the IPL 2025 super auction takes place.

Prior to the most recent mega auction, the BCCI permitted teams to keep a maximum of two foreign and three Indian players. They released Hardik due to a complicated scenario, but the franchise doesn’t want to make the same mistakes twice.

The most likely Indian players to be retained by MI are captain Hardik Pandya, Jasprit Bumrah, who is regarded as the finest T20 bowler in the world, and Suryakumar Yadav, who is the world’s top T20I hitter.

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Although the specifics of the IPL 2025 auction regulations are yet unknown, Rohit appears to be a strong contender for release should just three Indian players be permitted to be kept.

The Mumbai Indians want to switch up the captaincy at a moment when the Hitman can supervise the shift and assist Hardik in becoming an even stronger leader since Rohit Sharma is still a competent batsman at 36. By switching captains early on, MI are lessening the possibility that they would have to solve the issue when Rohit leaves the squad.

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