Published: Sep 09, 2014, 06:52 PM (IST)
Edited: Sep 12, 2014, 10:12 AM (IST)
Rohit Sharma’s injury leaves Mumbai Indians (MI) to place their hopes on their new skipper Kieron Pollard, who has played a pivotal role in the Mumbai franchise’s ascendency. Abhijit Banare analyses MI under Pollard’s leadership.
Rohit Sharma had done a fine job leading the MI side in Indian Premier League (IPL) and CLT20. His absence not only hurts the batting, it also unsettles the leadership in the team.
Why Pollard? On some other day, the franchisee would’ve requested Harbhajan Singh (lead in MI’s first CLT20 win in 2011) to fill the gap for one tournament. However, Pollard’s success in getting the Caribbean Premier League (CPL) title for Barbados Tridents gives the franchisee a viable option. A new captain means fresh ideas on the table. His success with Tridents also adds to his credibility and respect within the team.
Moreover, if an overseas player is leading, it’s critical that he needs to be a certainty when it comes to picking four overseas players even when not leading. Hence Pollard might have pipped Michael Hussey in this area. Much of this has been analysed later in this article.
Watch out for? Temperament. When as a player in MI, Pollard was infamously involved in many spats some of which crossed the line by a mile. He needs to keep his calm and focus on being proactive in the field than provocative. Leading MI will be different than leading Tridents. The communication differs. He has to co-ordinate with the majority Indian posters unlike in CPL where he mostly had fellow countrymen around.
Positives: Pollard has been with the franchisee from his first season. Thanks to his performances, he has already established a sense of seniority and gained respect. The other aspect which will help the new captain is the support of fellow players. He has Lendl Simmons and Corey Anderson in form, Ambati Rayudu is the backbone in batting in Rohit’s absence, a senior player like Harbhajan to assist in marshaling the bowling. These little support go a long way in making the job of the captain easier.
The overseas captaincy trouble: IPL at least provided a chance to regain ground if a team has lost its steam early on. But there won’t be any scope here. The IPL has given an example of how teams get affected when the overseas captain struggles. Ricky Ponting, Adam Gilchrist, Cameron White, Kumar Sangakkara and so on. The Mumbai squad already looks delicate in the absence of Rohit and Pollard occupying the overseas slot means they have to compromise in adjusting the other three overseas slots. Hence the franchisee had to be absolutely sure of it’s overseas player who can deliver consistently. Pollard’s all-round abilities makes him a key player in the side.
Overseas options: Apart from Pollard, Anderson, Lasith Malinga, Simmons and Hussey are the other foreign recruits. Anderson with a fine innings in the recent warm-up game, Simmons’ golden run in IPL and CPL make these two players a certainty in the team. And there’s no question of Malinga sitting out which means Hussey will be on the bench more often than not.
Finally, Pollard will have to marshal his resources well. The present squad doesn’t have enough batting resources. So the new captain will have a challenge to manage the available team efficiently to get his playing XI right.
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(Abhijit Banare is a reporter at CricketCountry. He is an avid quizzer and loves to analyse and dig out interesting facts which allows him to learn something new every day. Apart from cricket he also likes to keep a sharp eye on Indian politics)
