Nothing seems to be going in Mumbai Indians (MI) captain Hardik Pandya’s favour as the franchise suffered their second defeat in as many games of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 match on Wednesday. After a narrow defeat to Gujarat Titans (GT) in their season opener, MI were comprehensively beaten at the expense of SRH, with the hosts registering the biggest-ever team total in the history of the IPL. SRH posted 277-3 to beat MI by 31 runs in a six-hitting festival at the Uppal Stadium. While Hardik has been under the scanner for his captaincy, a video has emerged on social media, claiming that bowling coach Lasith Malinga ignored the MI captain, who went on to sit beside an agitated Kieron Pollard.
The video was shared by several users on social media platform on X.
Im the captain HARDIK
Give me my chair #HardikPandya #pollard#malinga#SRHvMI #MIvsSRH pic.twitter.com/gixxZFj7Qn— 2.0MSD CSK AMARAN (@ssv__remo) March 27, 2024
Hardik didn’t even tried to stop Malinga from getting up and leaving the chair for him. Look at the face of Pollard even he is not comfortable. Pandya doesn’t know how to respect seniors. He could have brought new chair #MIvsSRH #SRHvMI #RohitSharma #klaasen #HardikPandya pic.twitter.com/araISohypL
— Rishabh (@iamrishabhNP) March 27, 2024
Even Malinga looks unhappy with their new captain. #SRHvMI pic.twitter.com/tmhLGnmgIt
— Nibraz Ramzan (@nibraz88cricket) March 27, 2024
SRH opener Travis Head (62 off 24) and number three Abhishek Sharma (63 off 23) came up with a sensational display of power-hitting that saw the latter snatching the franchise record for the fastest fifty from the Australian within minutes.
Heinrich Klaasen (80 not out off 34 balls) provided the fireworks in the end to help SRH break an 11-year-old record. The previous highest total in IPL was 263 for five achieved by Royal Challengers Bangalore back in 2013. It was also the highest total recorded in a T20 league.
Mumbai bowlers were left shell-shocked by SRH’s six-hitting spree but their batters came out with a purpose and made a match out of what looked like a one way traffic at the innings break.
Eventually, they ended at 246 for five in 20 overs.
A record 38 sixes were plundered in the game and it was the first time 500 runs were scored in a T20 match.
“The wicket was good but 277, no matter how good or bad you bowl, if the opposition get 277 that means they batted very well. It was tough out there for bowlers. Close to 500 runs were scored so the wicket was helping the batters,” Hardik said after the match.
(With PTI Inputs)
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