The Gujarat Titans could not have had a better start to the IPL. They came out as champions in one year, amd ended up being runners-up in the next. However, IPL 2024 has had a gravitating impact on them. While they are still in the running for qualifiers, another trip to the playoffs will necessitate a strong drive and a significant shift in fortunes.
In an interview with Cricbuzz, GT’s Director of Cricket, Vikram Solanki, covers the season thus far, the mitigating circumstances in the build-up, Shubman Gill’s captaincy and more.
Shami is a huge loss for us
On asking about what Solanki thinks about the trade off right before the season and Mohammad Shami’s injury, he said When we came away from the auction, we were fairly happy with the players we got. I think losing Mohammed Shami has been a huge loss for us. That’s very apparent. Since then we’ve had injury issues, and that happens from one season to the next.
He further said that the management wasn’t aware of the extent of Shami’s injury.
“Mohammed Shami is a huge loss for us. The timing of when we were made aware or when it was apparent that we were going to be without Mohammed Shami, that wasn’t ideal. But that’s the case with injuries. There’s never a right time for one of your key players to suffer an injury. It just so happened that it was quite close to the season when we finally got to know that Shami wasn’t going to take part in this year’s IPL. We weren’t aware of the extent. We were aware of the injury but we were not anticipating it to play out as it did.”
“He’s an exceptional character, he’s a fine, fine batter.” Says Solanki about Gill.
After Pandya’s exit, GT had the task at hand of selecting their new captain. It was the exceptionally bright batter Shubman Gill who took to the role. Talking about Gill, Vikram Solanki said, “think so far he’s given a good account of himself. I don’t think his performance is affected or anything like that… I thought he’s batting pretty well. I thought he played particularly well in a couple of instances. He’s been practicing just as much. We’re looking forward to Shubman leading this team for the rest of this tournament and I am sure it’s a matter of time before you acknowledge that leadership might as well bring out the best in Shubman instead of thinking if it is too early or too late.”
He also added, “He’s an exceptional character, he’s a fine, fine batter. He’s somebody that gives a lot of thought to the game. All of those qualities go towards somebody that you would suggest will have a successful time as captain. We look forward to that being the case.”
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