The captain of the Mumbai Indians, Hardik Pandya, is leading the Reliance 1 team in the DY Patil T20 tournament, marking his eagerly anticipated comeback to cricket. Since sustaining an ankle injury during India’s ICC Cricket World Cup group stage match against Bangladesh in October of last year, Pandya has not participated in any international cricket matches for the Indian national team. He was not present for the home series of five Twenty20 internationals against Australia, nor for the three ODI and three T20I matches that made up the tour to South Africa. In Pandya’s absence, top-ranked T20I batsman Suryakumar Yadav assumed the role of captain.
Prior to the upcoming Indian Premier League (IPL) season, Pandya was traded from the Gujarat Titans (GT) to the Mumbai Indians (MI) in November of last year. Rohit Sharma, the MI captain who has won five IPL trophies, will be replaced by Pandya in the 2024 season of the lucrative league. Leading the way is Pandya, who is joined by Tilak Verma, Nehal Wadhera, Piyush Chawla, and Akash Madhwal. Under Pandya’s direction, these players may play for MI. However, Rohit Sharma will be captaining the team in the upcoming T20 World Cup, which is scheduled to take place in the USA and the West Indies in June, with the intention of putting an end to India’s ICC trophy drought.
Jay Shah, the secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), had earlier announced that Rohit Sharma will lead Men in Blue in the ICC T20 World Cup. He also voiced hope that Team India will emerge victorious in the T20 cricket competition and break their ten-year trophy drought. “We might not have won the 2023 World Cup final. However, we captured everyone’s hearts by winning ten straight games. Under Rohit Sharma’s leadership, I have no doubt that India will win the 2024 T20 World Cup in Barbados,” the BCCI secretary declared.
