IPL 2025: Hardik Pandya reflects on his tough captaincy stint with Mumbai Indians in 2024

Mumbai Indians skipper Hardik Pandya opened up about his debut captaincy stint with the five-time IPL champions in the last season of the Indian Premier League. The star all-rounder will be leading Mumbai Indians in the upcoming IPL 2025, where they will look to redeem themselves and turn the tide to clinch their record-extending sixth title of the tournament. 

In the last IPL season, things did go well for Mumbai Indians after a change in captaincy. MI management surprised with their decision to appoint Hardik Pandya as a captain, replacing their stalwart Rohit Sharma. The decision by the franchise disappointed the fans, who questioned the morale behind sacking Rohit from the captaincy duties despite leading Mumbai Indians to five IPL titles. 

Hardik Pandya led Gujarat Titans to two successive IPL finals in 2022 and 2023, winning the former edition, before he was traded to Mumbai Indians reportedly for INR 15 crore. However, the all-rounder leading the team was not welcomed by the fans, as he received hostile reception from the crowd, even at the Wankhede Stadium, where he was booed throughout the season. Even former Indian cricketer turned cricket commentator Sanjay Manjrekar had to ask the Mumbai Indians crowd at the Wankhede Stadium to 'behave'.

A year after the unsuccessful captaincy stint with Mumbai Indians, Hardik Pandya finally opened up on his tough phase. Speaking on JioHotstar’s show ‘Superstars’, the all-rounder stated that he did not want to leave the battleground and grind it out, adding that he was looking for survival rather than winning the tournament. 

“It's always about when you don't leave the battlefield. For me, it was about surviving, maybe not winning. That year was a year where, for the longest time, I had to hold my ground, not leave the battlefield which was the ground.” the 31-year-old said. 

“I realised how everything was panning out, that cricket will be my best friend, and he will get me out of it," he added.

Mumbai Indians had a disastrous IPL season last year under Hardik Pandya’s captaincy as they failed to qualify for the playoffs after finishing at the top of the points table, with four wins and 10 losses from 14 matches while accumulating 8 points. Hardik Pandya himself did not have an ideal season as an all-rounder, scoring just 216 runs at an average of 18 and picking only 11 wickets in 14 matches. After Mumbai Indians’ early exit from the tournament, Hardik Pandya received a massive criticism for his poor captaincy and demanded his resignation as captain.

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However, just two months later, Hardik Pandya was welcomed back to Mumbai with open arms by the Wankhede crowd after playing a crucial role in India’s T20 World Cup triumph. When Indian skipper Rohit Sharma lavished praise on the all-rounder for pulling off a thrilling win by bowling the final over, where he picked a crucial wicket of David Miller, the crowd at the Wankhede Stadium went berserk as they gave a huge cheers and massive applause to Hardik Pandya. It was the same crowd that had jeered and mocked him throughout the IPL 2024 season but later celebrated him as a hero for match-winning performance in the T20 World Cup 2024 final.

Speaking about the redemption at the Wankhede Stadium after the T20 World Cup win, Hardik Pandya stated it was a ‘360 degree’ turnaround for him. He added that it was a script written by God for him to experience the lowest and highest points of his career in the same year. 

“Those six months of my phase, where winning the World Cup and coming back and getting the kind of love we got. I think it was a complete 360 turnaround for me.” Hardik said. 

“And I think cricket was something which I knew that if I be persistent, if I be honest with my work, if I be really hardworking, I think I'll be able to come out of this. But when I didn't know, as exactly said, it was written in the script by God where it turned out to be two and a half months.” he added.

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Recently, Hardik Pandya played a crucial role again for Team Indian in their Champions Trophy triumph, defeating New Zealand in the final. He played a crucial innings of 18 off 18 balls while forming a 38-run partnership with KL Rahul for the sixth wicket in order to bring the Men in Blue closer to the 252-run target set by Kiwis. 

In the Champions Trophy 2025, Hardik Pandya aggregated 99 runs at an average of 24.75 in four innings. The stats might not look good but his ability to perform under pressure and anchor the innings in the middle-order was more impactful than what the numbers suggest. With the ball, Pandya picked four wickets at an average of 35.75 and an economy rate of 5.83.