Foreign players with Hardik Pandya, rest with Rohit Sharma: Reports on MI dressing room rift

Who would have thought that Mumbai Indians will become the first team to be eliminated from IPL 2024? It was supposed to be their year of a comeback after failing to lift the trophy since 2020. The five-time IPL champions are currently lurking at the bottom of the points table.

Their main aim will be to avoid the wooden spoon and win their remaining match against Lucknow Super Giants at Wankhede Stadium. For that, they also have to hope that Punjab Kings lose their last league match.

Mumbai faced the outrage of the fans ever since they replaced Rohit Sharma with Hardik Pandya as the team's captain. Rohit has led MI to five IPL titles and has a huge fan following in the city. Replacing him didn't come down well with the fans who booed Hardik Pandya in almost every match of IPL 2024.

Foreign players with Hardik Pandya, rest with Rohit Sharma

The problems started between two prominent figures in the team and it has now reached a point where two factions have been created, one each for Rohit Sharma and Hardik Pandya. According to a report in Dainik Jagran, Indian players are in favour of Rohit Sharma as team's captain while the overseas players are supporting Hardik Pandya.

Most of the MI's young players started playing IPL under Rohit Sharma and understand his role in shaping up their careers. Meanwhile, overseas players like Tim David termed Hardik Pandya as the 'glue' in the team.

"Hardik was the glue that held us together and gave us a chance to play with freedom at the back end. Hardik has been phenomenal in the way he has been playing for the team," David had earlier said.

The report also claimed that Rohit Sharma and Hardik Pandya have hardly practised together in this IPL season. In fact, Rohit, Tilak Varma, and Suryakumar Yadav even left the ground when they saw Pandya walking up to the nets before the game against KKR, the report added.

Both Rohit Sharma and Hardik Pandya have had a disppointing IPL 2024. Rohit Sharma had a fantastic start to this season but his form dipped dramatically in the second-half of the tournament. Overall, he scored 349 runs in 13 innings at an average of 29.08. Meanwhile, Hardik Pandya has scored just 200 runs and taken 11 wickets in 13 matches so far.

WATCH: Ravichandran Ashwin's brilliant switch hit off Rahul Chahar during RR vs PBKS match in IPL 2024

In the T20 World Cup 2024, which is scheduled to begin just after the IPL, Rohit Sharma will be India's captain while Hardik Pandya will be his deputy. 

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