IPL 2022: Captaincy could have cost him his place in the Indian side: Ravi Shastri

Despite having a strong squad on paper, the Kings struggled to find consistency this season as they failed to make it to the IPL 2022 playoffs. While some of the big guns failed to fire, another reason for Punjab’s poor show was skipper Mayank Agarwal’s poor form with the bat.

Scoring just 196 runs from 12 matches at an average of 16.33, the Punjab skipper endured a below average season. Mayank was handed the reigns after former skipper KL Rahul left the franchise and went on to join Lucknow Super Giants. Former India head coach Ravi Shastri believes the burden of leading the side could have been one of the main reasons for Mayank’s poor show.

Shastri added both Mayank and Ravindra Jadeja, who was handed the CSK captaincy ahead of the season, could be on the same both as both endured poor runs.

Speaking on ESPINcricinfo’s show T20 Time Out, Shastri said, “Mayank Agarwal is in the same boat as Ravindra Jadeja. Guys who have never captained sides, you ask them to captain franchises. This is no disrespect to Mayank. Because I love the kid. I know how he plays his cricket, how determined he is.

“But it’s putting a guy who is very good at what he does in a wrong place. And it can have problems. Serious problems. Serious repercussions. It could have cost him his place in the Indian side, Test side, everything, because the selectors will judge on current form, they will judge on what they actually see.”

You saw Jadeja turning out to be a different cricketer: Shastri

Shastri went on to add that pressure on captaincy can weigh anybody down. The former Indian cricketer went on to give Jadeja’s example, who failed under the pressure of captaincy as CSK finised second last on the points table. After MS Dhoni handed Jadeja the reigns, the CSK all rounder handed the captaincy back to Dhoni after Chennai’s got off to a dismal show.

“So it hurts me because I know how good a player he is. But obviously the pressures of captaincy will weigh on anybody’s mind. You saw Jadeja turning out to be a different cricketer. Mayank Agarwal turned out to be a different cricketer. We know how good they are as individual cricketers. In future this is a strong message to the franchise to be very smart about who you pick as captain,” Shastri signed off.

While Punjab finished sixth on the points table, with seven wins from 14 games, defending champions Chennai finised the season at eighth place with just four wins from 14 matches.