Hardik Pandya won the toss on his return to Mumbai Indians as captain and elected to bowl first against Gujarat Titans in the fifth match of the IPL 2024. Gerald Coetzee and Luke Wood are set to make their IPL debuts while Gujarat name three new players in their playing eleven.
Suryakumar Yadav failed to recover from his injury and is not part of the team for their first game. Naman Dhir, the 24-year-old batter from Haryana and Mumbai state team's in-form spinner Shams Mulani received their maiden IPL caps. New signings Romario Shepherd and Mohammad Nabi are named in the impact sub list while Arjun Tendulkar misses the squad entirely.
"We are gonna bowl first," Hardik said at the toss. "Looks like a decent track, might get better if the dew arrives. Feels good to be back. My birthplace is Gujarat, a lot of success came in Gujarat, very grateful to the crowd and this state. My cricketing birth happened in Mumbai, so really good to be back. It's been almost two weeks, we started the camp. We have four quicks, three spinners and seven batters. Making sure all the departments are looked after."
For Gujarat Titans, new captain Shubman Gill decided to hand debuts to new signings Azmatullah Omarzai, Umesh Yadav and Spencer Johnson but surprisingly left out New Zealand veteran Kane Williamson and Indian pacer Mohit Sharma.
"Feels very excited, to be able to captain at a stadium where I have a lot of fond memories," Shubamn said. "This has been one of our strengths, the last couple of seasons the support that we've got from the fans has been tremendous for us. I was here a week prior before this game, played a practice match, and had a couple of practice sessions. Everyone is looking good, everyone is looking fit. We have got three players making debuts for GT Umesh bhai, Spencer and Omarzai."
Gujarat Titans Playing XI: Shubman Gill (c), Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Sai Sudharsan, Vijay Shankar, David Miller, Azmatullah Omarzai, Rahul Tewatia, Rashid Khan, Umesh Yadav, Sai Kishore, Spencer Johnson.
Mumbai Indians Playing XI: Rohit Sharma, Ishan Kishan (wk), Tilak Varma, Naman Dhir, Hardik Pandya (c), Tim David, Shams Mulani, Piyush Chawla, Gerald Coetzee, Jasprit Bumrah, Luke Wood.
Gujarat Titans Subs: BR Sharath, Mohit Sharma, Manav Suthar, Abhinav Manohar, Noor Ahmad.
Mumbai Indians Subs: Dewald Brevis, Romario Shepherd, Vishnu Vinod, Nehal Wadhera, Mohammad Nabi.
