IPL 2024 is going on, but the journey of the Mumbai Indians has come to an end. The Mumbai Indians did not like the captaincy of new captain Hardik Pandya much. Even though this team played its last match in the tournament on the evening of May 17, it was out of the playoff race long ago. Under Hardik’s command, the Mumbai Indians were the first team to be eliminated from the race for the IPL 2024 playoffs. It is clear that Mumbai team management’s move to remove Rohit and hand over the captaincy to Hardik backfired.
Neither the beginning nor the end were good for the Mumbai Indians. The team started its journey in IPL 2024 with a defeat, and its story ended with the defeat itself. The team played 14 matches in the group stage, out of which it could only win four. That means the Hardik Pandya-led Mumbai Indians had to face defeat in 10 matches. This situation was something this team had never seen before. End of the journey by finishing 10th in the league of 10 teams. On top of that, the poor game of the captain is an aside. These things have caused tension among Mumbai Indians.
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Who will take over Hardik, who has failed on every front?
The question is: What did Hardik Pandya do? What was the benefit of handing over the captaincy to him? If you find answers to these questions, you will know that, after what Hardik has done this season, no team will want to keep him. Hardik Pandya has failed on all three fronts: captaincy, batting, and bowling.
While batting, his average in 14 matches was only 18. No half-century came from his bat. And forget the century. He scored only 216 runs in 13 innings of 14 matches and was sixth among the highest run scorers for the team. Similar was the condition of Hardik Pandya in bowling, too. In bowling, he took only 11 wickets at an average of 35.18. During this period, his economy also remained above 10.
The captaincy, on which Mumbai Indians had expressed maximum confidence in Hardik Pandya, also broke badly. Pandya’s captaincy has been continuously criticized during the IPL 2024. Be it Bumrah not bowling with the new ball at the beginning of the tournament or something else,.
He did nothing and suffered a loss of Rs 30 lakh
He will not be able to play the first match of the next season. His team could not finish its overs on time against the Lucknow Super Giants at Wankhede Stadium. This was the last match of the IPL 2024 for Mumbai. This means that Hardik will not be able to play the first match of the next season. If Hardik moves to another team for the next season, he will not be able to play the first match for that particular team.
This was the third time in this IPL season that Mumbai failed to maintain the minimum overrate. As a result, in addition to the one-match ban, Hardik was fined Rs 30 lakh, and the remaining playing twelve, including the impact players, were individually fined Rs 12 lakh, or 50 percent of their match fees.
An IPL media release said, “Mumbai Indians captain Hardik Pandya has been fined for slow overrate during the match against Lucknow Supergiants in IPL 2024 at Wankhede Stadium on May 17.” It said, “This was the Mumbai Indians’ third offense of slow over-rate under the IPL Code of Conduct; hence, Hardik Pandya has been fined Rs 30 lakh and suspended for the next match.”
Let us tell you, this has been a disappointing season for the Mumbai Indians. In their last match in the league stage too, they had to face an 18-run defeat against the Lucknow Super Giants. This season, the Mumbai team won only four matches and remained in 10th place in the points table with eight points.
After becoming the captain in place of Rohit Sharma, the fans booed Hardik the whole season. Its clear effect was visible in his performance as well. This season, he scored only 216 runs in 13 innings at an average of just 18. Also with the ball, he took 11 wickets in 12 innings, and his economy was 10.75. Mumbai coach Mark Boucher also admitted that the way the fans criticized Hardik had an impact on the team and Hardik’s performance.
