Hardik Pandya has created a stir by returning to the cricket field after 2 months. He played a stormy inning of 77 runs while playing for Baroda team in Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy 2025. His innings contributed significantly to Baroda’s 7-wicket victory over Punjab. Hardik was earlier seen playing in the Super-4 match of Asia Cup 2025 against Sri Lanka.

Hardik Pandya suffered a quadricep injury (front part of the thigh) in the Super-4 match against Sri Lanka in the Asia Cup 2025. Because of that he had to stay away from cricket for 2 months. Let us tell you that he is not playing in the ODI series against South Africa.

He will have to prove his fitness by playing 2 matches for Baroda in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy. By playing a strong inning of 77 runs in 42 balls in the first match, he proved that he has recovered from the injury. Along with this, he also bowled 4 overs. It is possible that he may return in the T20 series against South Africa.

Hardik was expensive in bowling

Playing first, Punjab team had scored a huge score of 222 runs. Captain Abhishek Sharma created havoc and played an inning of 50 runs in 19 balls. Hardik Pandya bowled 4 overs for Baroda, also took one wicket but he gave away 52 runs. Anmolpreet Singh played a half-century inning of 69 runs for Punjab. Naman Dheer also contributed 39 runs.

But everything went up in smoke with batting

Baroda team, which came to chase the target of 223 runs, lost the second wicket on the second ball of the eighth over at the score of 92. Hardik Pandya came to bat at fourth position. He scored unbeaten 77 runs in 42 balls. In this innings played at a strike rate of 183.33, 7 fours and 4 sixes came from his bat.

Also read:

Australia’s dreaded batsman out of the second Ashes test, England also made a big change in the playing eleven.

Hardik Pandya on Mumbai Indians Loss: In IPL 2025, Mumbai Indians have lost second consecutive defeat. Gujarat Titans have defeated MI by 36 runs. Earlier, Mumbai had to face defeat by 4 wickets at the hands of CSK. This was also the first time in IPL 2025 when Mumbai team was playing under Hardik’s captaincy. Remind you that Hardik returned to the match against Gujarat after completing the ban of a match. Captain Pandya appeared disappointed after the defeat against GT.

Hardik Pandya told the reason for defeat

In the post match presentation, Hardik Pandya said that small mistakes from the team have become the cause of his team’s defeat. He said, “We made very small mistakes, causing a loss of 20-25 runs, which is very high in a T20 match. The opening batsmen of Gujarat Titans made good batting, they made very little mistakes, played very well and were succeeding in scoring runs by playing unnecessary shots.”

This work will have to be done in future

Mumbai Indians captain Hardik said that this is the initial asylum of IPL 2025 and a lot is yet to be tested. He also said that the batsmen have to understand their responsibility as soon as possible. Hardik also emphasized that it was the most difficult task to hold the slow balls on this pitch. Looking at the figures, 37 slow balls were fed from Mumbai, in which he got only one wicket. On the other hand, the Gujarat bowlers bowled 32 Slover balls, in which he took 3 wickets.

Gujarat Titans have put a hat -trick of victory against MI at Narendra Modi Stadium. In the last three matches here, Gujarat has defeated Mumbai. At the same time, the victory-defeat against Mumbai at Narendra Modi Stadium in Gujarat has now become 4-2.

Also read:

GT Vs Mi: Mumbai Indians lost against Gujarat’s mistakes, know 3 big reasons for Mi’s defeat