Image Credit- CA
In lieu of Aiden
Markram, who captained the Sunrisers Hyderabad squad in the 2023 season, Pat
Cummins has been named captain for the 2024 Indian Premier League.
Although Cummins has never captained a team in the IPL or even in elite T20
cricket, his appointment follows a fruitful stint as Australia’s captain, where
he guided his team to triumph in both the 2023 ODI World Cup and the World Test
Championship, both of which they won against India in the finals.
With Cummins filling
in as the foreign fast bowler, SRH will now have the option to play their new
recruits, Australian batsman Travis Head and Sri Lankan legspinner Wanindu
Hasaranga, along with finisher Heinrich Klaasen, in place of Markram, should
they so choose. The other two foreign quicks in the team are Fazalhaq Farooqi
of Afghanistan and Marco Jansen of South Africa. Glenn Phillips of New Zealand
completes the team’s eight foreign players.
In order to
concentrate on his international cricket career, Cummins withdrew from the IPL
2023. However, he participated in the 2024 season’s auction and became the
first player in IPL history to get an offer of INR 20 crore (about USD 2.4
million). The Kolkata Knight Riders quickly broke SRH’s record bid of INR 20.50
crore (about USD 2.47 million) for Cummins by bidding INR 24.75 crore (around
USD 2.98 million) for Mitchell Starc. Coincidentally, Cummins had played with
the KKR team from 2020 to 2022.
After three seasons,
Cummins will be the third captain of the SRH. Before being let go ahead of the
2023 season, when SRH finished bottom with just four wins in 14 league games
under Markram’s captaincy, Kane Williamson had led them to an eighth-place finish
in 2022. Markram is still a member of the SRH team for the following season
despite his IPL 2023 performance of just 248 runs at a strike rate of 129. In
2022 and 2023, Markram guided the Sunrisers Eastern Cape team to consecutive
championships in the SA20, Cricket South Africa’s T20 league.
Ahead of the 2024
IPL season, SRH announced the appointment of Daniel Vettori, a former left-arm
spinner from New Zealand and captain, as their new head coach. Lara had
previously succeeded Tom Moody as coach for the 2023 IPL.
James Franklin, a former all-arounder from New Zealand, took Dale Steyn’s
position as SRH’s bowling coach.