Mumbai Indians finished at last in the IPL 2024 points table after their 10th defeat of the season on Friday night that concluded a forgettable campaign for the five-time champions. It was the second time in three seasons that MI have a bottom-of-the-table finish against their name.
It was a tough campaign for MI as a team, particularly for their new captain Hardik Pandya who also had to deal with the hostile crowds occasionally.
MI head coach Mark Boucher says he felt sorry for Pandya and claimed that the reaction of the crowd did impact Pandya who returned to MI ahead of the season after spending two highly successful seasons with Gujarat Titans.
“It wasn’t great hearing all the boos. I felt sorry for Hardik as well. It’s never nice to have to go through something like that. I do think that there are certain things that did affect individuals, which ultimately did affect the team,” Boucher told reporters on Friday.
Boucher says there external factors may have clouded Pandya’s judgement as a leader.
“There’s a lot of stuff going on around him that, maybe, clouded his thoughts every now and again, which is tough for him as a leader as well. He certainly had a lot of support within our dressing room as well and guys trying to help him out as well. But it’s a tough thing to go through as a player,” he said.
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Boucher says off-field issues have to be addressed by the team management.
“Those are the sort of things that, yes, we do need to sit down and address and hopefully make some good calls going forward, to address the off-field stuff that we can get it right on the field,” the South African said.
“Ultimately, this is a professional unit and players and staff and everyone alike gets judged about the performance that they put on the field. If there’s stuff that’s happening off the field which is hampering that, then we need to address it,” he added.
Boucher though feels that the experience will stand Pandya in a good stead.
“A lot of the stuff that he’s going through is, personally, maybe a little uncalled for. It’ll certainly be a learning curve for Hardik as his growth in leadership. While times are tough now, a couple of things will pass and it’ll make him a tougher leader and it’ll certainly grow him in the role as well,” he said.
While there will be a review of the abysmal season, Boucher is against taking a knee-jerk reaction, hinting that Pandya should be persisted as the team captain.
“I think so. As I said, we haven’t had discussions. Everything’s been about the cricket stuff at the moment. Going forward, I’m sure that he is the guy that the franchise would like to take forward. We’ll wait and see. We’ll have these conversations at a later stage,” Boucher said.
Boucher claimed a reason for Pandya’s struggle with the bat had to do with the role change from GT to MI.
Pandya managed 216 runs from 14 matches, finishing the season without a half-century to his name.
“When Hardik was playing for Mumbai Indians, he was a finisher. He was playing in that sort of role with Polly (Kieron Pollard). He then went to (Gujarat) Titans and he was batting in a completely different scenario,” Boucher said.
“He was batting up front. There were slight technical adjustments that he had to make to his game in order to face a newer ball and the different lengths when you’re facing a new ball as well. He made himself aware of that as well. Throughout the whole season, it was a work in progress trying to get him back to the new role that he was playing now, more as a finisher, batting in the back end of innings as well,” he added.
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