The video of Hardik Pandya offering milk to Lord Shiva and then chanting slokas with folded hands was shared by news agency ANI.
Mumbai Indians captain Hardik Pandya offered prayers at the Somnath Temple in Gujarat on Friday. The video of the Indian all-rounder offering milk to Lord Shiva and then chanting slokas with folded hands was shared by news agency ANI. Hardik, like many other MI cricketers, is currently on a break due to the six-day gap the franchise received in the ongoing IPL 2024. MI played their last match against the Rajasthan Royals on April 1. Their next fixture is against the Delhi Capitals at the Wanhede Stadium in Mumbai on Sunday.
Cricketer Hardik Pandya offers prayers at the Somnath temple in Veraval, Gujarat(PTI)
Hardik is going through one of the toughest phases of his professional career. Ever since he moved back to MI from the Gujarat Titans and was named as captain by the five-time champion, replacing one of the most successful captains of the tournament, Rohit Sharma, he has been subjected to endless trolls, boos in the stadium and heavy criticism from various quarters.
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The fact that MI lost their first three matches of the 17th edition and Hardik himself has been below-par, has only made the matters worse.
Hardik didn’t even bowl in MI’s last match against RR and his scores in the tournament so far have been 11, 24 and 34.
Former India head coach Ravi Shastri advised Pandya to stay calm and weather the storm with solid performances.
“This is not the Indian cricket team that’s playing. This is franchise cricket. They have paid top dollar. They are the bosses. It’s their entitlement as to who they want as captain. Okay, where I think this could have been handled better was with more clarity in communication,” Shastri told Star Sports’ ‘Cricket Live Show’.
MI are languishing at the last position in the IPL 2024 points table and is the only side yet to win a match this season. They, however, have received a huge boost in the form of Suryakumar Yadav. The No.1 T20I batter missed the first three matches of the season due to an injury.
if Suryakumar plays, the Hardik Pandya-led team will hope that his presence helps them with the anticipated turnaround.
The 33-year-old aggressive batter has been out of action since January. He underwent surgery to treat sports hernia and was also nursing an ankle injury which he had sustained during India’s tour of South Africa late last year.
Suryakumar was the first to arrive for the training session at the Wankhede Stadium, more than an hour before his teammates came for the afternoon session.
Suryakumar walked into one of the two nets and batted for more than an hour, not looking to exert himself but getting his body in rhythm and getting his strokes going a few days after he was given the clearance to join the Mumbai Indians’ squad by the National Cricket Academy (NCA) staff.
