Indian Premier League- 2025: Suryakumar Yadav to replace Hardik Pandya as MI's new captain

The Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 season will start on 22 March in Kolkata, with the final match scheduled for 25 May. The first match will be played between Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) and Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) at Eden Gardens. Just before the start of IPL 2025, the Mumbai Indians (MI) franchise has announced the name of the new captain for its opening match. They have handed over the command to Suryakumar Yadav in place of Hardik Pandya.

Hardik Pandya himself gave this information

Let us tell you that Mumbai has to play its first match against Chennai Super Kings (CSK) on 23rd March, and this match will be held in Chennai itself. Pandya will not play in this match due to a one-match ban. This ban was imposed on Pandya last season due to a slow over rate and will be implemented for the first match of the Mumbai team this season. However, Pandya will resume captaincy from the next match.

Pandya himself shared this news about the captaincy change with Suryakumar Yadav during a press conference with head coach Mahela Jayawardene on March 19. He said, "Surya is currently the captain of the Indian T20 team. In my absence, he is the right candidate for this (captaincy)."

The captaincy was last taken over in 2023

The last time Surya captained the Mumbai team was during the 2023 season. Rohit Sharma was the captain, and Surya took charge in his absence. Mumbai won this match, where Surya scored 43 runs off 25 balls. In that match, Rohit came out to open as an impact player but could score only 20 runs in 13 balls.

For more updates on IPL 2025 and other sports news, visit Sports Vaartha. To read full match details, visit Vaartha ePaper.