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Newly appointed Mumbai Indians (MI) captain Hardik Pandya is reportedly set to miss IPL 2024 due to a knee injury. The star all-rounder suffered an unfortunate injury while fielding off his own bowling during the 2023 World Cup match against Bangladesh.
Hardik missed the rest of the World Cup and has been on the sidelines since. In a surprising turn of events, Mumbai Indians traded him from Gujarat Titans (GT) last month. They also recently replaced Rohit Sharma with Pandya as the new captain of the franchise for IPL 2024.
It was perceived by many as a ruthless decision as Rohit Sharma is regarded as arguably the best captain in IPL history, alongside MS Dhoni. He led MI to five IPL trophies in 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019, and 2020. Fans were disappointed with MI management's decision due to the same reason.
Hardik Pandya also boasts a decent captaincy record. He moved to Gujarat Titans in 2022 and lifted the trophy that year. In his second year as captain, GT topped the points table in the league stage of IPL 2023 before losing the final.
MI seemingly decided to look towards the future and appointed Hardik Pandya as captain for the upcoming season. However, the latest reports on NDTV suggest that Pandya might miss the upcoming season as he might not recover from the knee injury by then.
Fans took note of the latest development and expressed their reaction by sharing memes on social media. Here are some of the top memes:
"He should be happy and that's why he has gone there again"- Ashish Nehra on Hardik Pandya returning to MI
Gujarat Titans head coach Ashish Nehra recently opened up that Hardik Pandya expressed his willingness to go to Mumbai Indians ahead of the upcoming season. Speaking to JioCinema on the matter, Nehra said:
"Hardik Pandya going back to that team has not caused a huge surprise. He played for that team for so many years, he showed his desire to go back there.
He continued:
"Our management's nature is such that, we think if a player wants to go there, right. He should be happy and that's why he has gone there again. Replacing someone like Hardik is difficult, but we tried our best.
Who should become MI captain for IPL 2024 if the reports turn out to be true? Let us know your views in the comments section.
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