Hardik Pandya To Miss MI First Game in IPL 2025: Mumbai Indians captain Hardik Pandya will miss his team’s opening game in IPL 2025 against the Chennai Super Kings. This is because the skipper will be serving a one-match ban for the team’s slow over-rate in their last league stage in IPL 2024. Suryakumar Yadav is set to replace Hardik as the Mumbai captain for this match.
Pandya was brought back to the Mumbai Indians ahead of the 2024 season of the Indian Premier League after a successful two-year sting captaining the Gujarat Titans.
However, despite several superstars being in their squad, MI had a horrid 2024 season, with them finishing last in the league, and Hardik himself being severely out of form.
Hardik Pandya To Miss MI First Game in IPL 2025
In their last game of the season in 2024, against the Lucknow Super Giants, the Indians bowled with a slow overrate. Since it was his team’s third over-rate offence of the season, the team captain Pandya picked up a one-match ban, which he will serve at the start of the coming season.
MI head coach Mahela Jayawardene addressed the media at a press conference on Wednesday, where he confirmed that his team’s captain would miss the opening game of the season. He said,
“We have been officially communicated that he [Hardik] has to miss [the first game].”
Hardik Pandya himself commented on the situation, clearly not aware of the citation beforehand, he was critical of this ruling.
“That is out of my control. Last year what occurred is part of the sport. We bowled the last over one-and-a-half or two minutes late. At that point, I didn’t know the consequences. It is unfortunate, but the rules say it. I will have to go with the process. Next season, if they continue or not continue [with this rule], I think that is on the higher authorities. They can definitely see what best can be done.”
Suryakumar Yadav then becomes the obvious choice to lead the team. While former MI captain and India ODI and Test captain Rohit Sharma is in the side, Surya is the captain of the Indian Cricket Team in the T20s.
As for the Mumbai Indians, they will kick off their IPL 2025 campaign on Sunday, March 23, against arch-rivals Chennai Super Kings in Chennai’s MA Chidambaram Stadium.
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