"Hardik Pandya to be exposed sooner than later.."- Navjot Singh Sidhu

Former India cricketer and Hindi commentary king Navjot Singh Sidhu has offered a piece of advice to Mumbai Indians captain Hardik Pandya following his team’s 3rd loss last night.

MI were playing their first home game of the season and were expecting to register their first victory of the season but in turn, they posted the lowest total scored as of now in IPL 2024. The harshness of fans on the franchise’s captain increased further after it.

The amount of criticism, trolling, and booing that Hardik Pandya has had to go through is unseen. The level of booing was so much so that Sanjay Manjrekar, during the toss time, asked the jampacked crowd in Wankhede to behave themselves in front of their captain.

The crowd had extremely loud jeers when Manjrekar announced Pandya’s name in the middle before he won the toss and elected to bat first.

Things, instead of changing for the good, took a rather tragic turn as MI’s top-order of Ishan Kishan, Rohit Sharma, Naman Dhir, and Dewald Brevis left the crease when the team’s score was at 2o. Trent Boult led to 3 golden ducks of Rohit, Naman, and Brevis whereas Kishan departed after scoring 16. It was Hardik Pandya and Tilak Varma who handled things in the middle for a while but all MI could post was 125.

Sidhu asks Hardik Pandya to focus on team combination

In response to Mumbai’s target of 126, the Rajasthan Royals chased down the total by the 16th en route to Riyan Parag’s half-century with RR winning the affair by 6 wickets.

The inaugural champions are now the only team in the league to have a 100% win record after the first 3 matches. Following the loss, while speaking to Star Sports, Navjot Singh Sidhu had some advice for Hardik Pandya.

Sidhu started by saying that everyone would have liked Hardik Pandya and his captaincy in case MI had won their previous two games against Gujarat Titans and Sunrisers Hyderabad. But since they ended up on the losing side, the 5-time champions have no option but to reflect.

The legendary commentator then highlighted the kind of losses Pandya and co. had to suffer, especially against SRH where Mumbai had conceded the biggest-ever total in IPL history.

“There is nothing that succeeds like success. If Mumbai Indians had won the last two games, everyone would have been silent. I think he (Pandya) should focus on the team combination. When you concede 277 runs, everyone screams that your bowling is not good enough. How could a team score 277 when it was unprecedented in the tournament? The other game (against GT) was a close one. They were defeated, not disgraced.” – Sidhu said on air via Star Sports. 

Sidhu asks Pandya to take inspiration from MS Dhoni

Then Navjot Singh Sidhu asked Hardik Pandya to learn from the great man himself – MS Dhoni. Sidhu suggested that Pandya should not only focus on team combination but also find a suitable replacement like CSK did with Devon Conway.

“Look at what Dhoni does. When Devon Conway, who was the leading run-getter for him last season, got injured, he got in Rachin Ravindra, who is similar and somewhat better. He needs to find that kind of replacement or he will be exposed.” – Sidhu concluded.