According to sources, Shubman Gill, a prominent Indian cricket team player, will take over the captaincy of the Gujarat Titans in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024. This comes after all-rounder Hardik Pandya completed his move to the Mumbai Indians on Sunday. Pandya had been leading the team for the past two years and even guided them to the IPL title in their debut season in 2022. However, Pandya’s transfer to MI in an all-cash deal has opened up an opportunity for Shubman Gill to showcase his leadership skills.
The completion of Pandya’s trade-off with the Gujarat Titans was officially confirmed after 72 hours of intense negotiations. At 5 pm on Sunday, the IPL retention window closed, and the Gujarat Titans included their IPL-winning captain in the retention list, which raised a few eyebrows. However, it was revealed that the necessary paperwork had not yet been finalized, causing the IPL and BCCI to withhold their approval for this highly anticipated move of the transfer season.
A senior BCCI official and IPL Governing Council member, speaking on the condition of anonymity, stated, “Yes, Hardik’s trade-off was completed after 5 pm. The deal has now been formalized, and he is officially a Mumbai Indians player. It was a tripartite all-cash deal, with Mumbai Indians trading their all-rounder Cameron Green to RCB in an all-cash deal. This provided them with the necessary funds to settle an all-cash deal with the Gujarat Titans and acquire Hardik’s services.”
It is worth mentioning that Mumbai Indians had previously purchased Cameron Green for a whopping Rs 17.5 crore during the last auction. Therefore, the funds required to acquire Hardik were not available until that deal was finalized.
Hardik Pandya was initially chosen by the Gujarat Titans before the 2022 auction from the pool of available players for the two new franchises, Gujarat Titans and Lucknow Super Giants. His reported fee was Rs 15 crore, and under his captaincy, the team reached back-to-back finals, winning the championship in their inaugural year and narrowly losing to CSK in 2023.
(With PTI inputs)
