The Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise Punjab Kings (PBKS) has reacted to the reports of Mayank Agarwal‘s sacking as captain after rumours went viral on Tuesday (August 23) that PBKS was set to remove Agarwal from his duties.
The Mohali-based franchise, on Wednesday, issued a statement on social media rubbishing the claims, stating no team official has made any comments about the possible change in captaincy.
“News reports published by a certain sports News website pertaining to the captaincy of the Punjab Kings franchise has been making the rounds in the last few days. We would like to state that no official of the team has issued any statement on the same,” Punjab Kings wrote in a tweet.
News reports published by a certain sports News website pertaining to captaincy of the Punjab Kings franchise has been making the rounds in the last few days. We would like to state that no official of the team has issued any statement on the same.
— Punjab Kings (@PunjabKingsIPL) August 24, 2022
Agarwal was appointed as PBKS captain ahead of IPL 2022 after KL Rahul moved to the Lucknow Super Giants (LSG). Under Agarwal’s leadership, PBKS endured a disappointing run and finished sixth with 14 points from as many matches.
The Kings managed to assemble a star-studded squad in the mega auction, roping in the likes of Liam Livingstone, Shikhar Dhawan, Kagiso Rabada and Jonny Bairstow, among others. However, they failed to make it to the playoffs once again.
Captain Agarwal also had a disappointing season with the bat, adding only 196 runs in 13 matches at a strike rate of 122.50 and a dreadful average of 16.33. Overall, in the cash-rich league, the Bangalore-born batter has scored 2331 runs in 107 innings with the help of one hundred and 12 half-centuries.