It has been a turbulent time for captain Hardik Pandya and his team Mumbai Indians in IPL 2024, as the five-time champions are winless in the competition after back-to-back losses in Ahmedabad and Hyderabad.
If this wasn’t enough, then Hardik being subjected to relentless boos and jeers from crowds in both venues, and even subjected to a discriminatory term, has added more noise to the build-up of MI playing their first home game against Rajasthan Royals at the Wankhede Stadium on Monday.
Of late, there have been multiple reports saying the Mumbai Cricket Association (MCA) has planned steps to keep fans in check and be even ejected from the stadium for booing or jeering at Pandya when MI play RR on Monday evening. But sources have revealed that no such thing is on the cards from the association.
“There have been no instructions given for this specific game on Monday. There have been set guidelines in place, which are issued by BCCI on spectators behaviour in the stadium over the years. It is the same process that we have followed, as per the BCCI directives, and we continue to follow the same for all games, whether it’s IPL or domestic cricket games,” said sources.
The reason behind Hardik being viciously targeted by fans mainly stems from his switch from Gujarat Titans, a team he captained to IPL 2022 win and IPL 2023 final, to Mumbai Indians, who gave him his first big break in the tournament.
What has also added more fuel to the brutal fan anger towards Hardik is him replacing five-time IPL winning captain Rohit Sharma as the MI captain ahead of IPL 2024, shortly after his switch to the team was confirmed in November 2023.
MCA too has come out with its official statement on Sunday afternoon, denying any security measures against fans who could target Hardik during MI-RR game. “There are rumours that MCA has instructed security against people who support Rohit or boo Hardik, while we know this is incorrect. This is baseless rumours, and no instructions like this have been given. We as MCA are following BCCI guidelines on crowd behaviour policy.”
In IPL 2024, MI lost to GT by six runs in Ahmedabad and faced a 32-run loss in run-fest of a game to SRH, who posted the highest IPL total ever of 277/3. With MI now at the bottom of the 10-team points table, Pandya & Co have all odds stacked up against them in their quest to resurrect their early campaign at home against a formidable RR on 1 April.
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