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Kevin Pietersen, the ex-England cricketer, playfully concurred with Gautam Gambhir‘s recent playful jabs at his leadership skills. Pietersen humorously embraced Gambhir’s comments on social media, acknowledging his past shortcomings at the helm. This banter sparked from Gambhir’s retort to Pietersen and AB de Villiers‘ critique of all-rounder Hardik Pandya‘s stint as captain during the lacklustre Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 for the Mumbai Indians (MI).
Gautam Gambhir criticizes Kevin Pietersen
Pandya came under heavy scrutiny for his leadership during MI’s turbulent tournament journey. Pietersen and de Villiers were among the critics who doubted Pandya’s leadership skills. Nonetheless, Gambhir swiftly retaliated, pointing out their own mediocre track records as captains and challenging their right to pass judgment on Pandya.
“It’s not important what experts are saying, it’s their job to say something or the other. My opinion has always been that you judge someone’s captaincy by his team’s performance. If MI had performed well (this year), all experts would have been praising him. Today MI have not performed well and that’s why everyone is talking about it,” Gambhir said on Sportskeeda.
Pietersen’s hilarious response to Gambhir
Pietersen playfully embraced his own captaincy flaws on social media after Gambhir’s critique, accepting “He’s not wrong. I was a terrible captain!!!”
He’s not wrong. I was a terrible captain!!! 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂@GautamGambhir 🩵
— Kevin Pietersen🦏 (@KP24) May 14, 2024
Also READ: IPL 2024: Gautam Gambhir slams AB de Villiers for his verdict on Hardik Pandya’s captaincy
Hardik Pandya’s struggle in IPL 2024
The premature departure of MI from the IPL 2024 playoffs ignited discussions, particularly regarding the choice to install Pandya as captain over Rohit Sharma. Despite optimistic forecasts, MI found themselves ousted from the playoff contention, managing only four victories out of thirteen matches, casting doubts on Pandya’s leadership capabilities.
Moreover, Hardik’s lackluster performance further added to the disappointment of the season, as he could only muster 200 runs at an average of 18 and claimed a mere 11 wickets with an unfavorable economy rate of 11.
