Breaking! IPL 2024: Shubman Gill Appointed Gujarat Titans Captain As Hardik Pandya Joins Mumbai Indians

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Gujarat Titans have appointed young India batter Shubman Gill as their new captain for the IPL 2024 season on Monday (November 27). The decision comes after GT's captain Hardik Pandya was traded to the five-time champions Mumbai Indians at the close of the IPL trade window.

The IPL 2024 trade window closed on Sunday (November 26) after a lot of drama unfolded as the retention deadline ended.

Youngest Captains in IPL history

Gujarat Titans took to their social media handle, X, on November 27 to announce the 24-year-old Gill as the team's captain. After Suresh Raina, Virat Kohli, Steve Smith, Rishabh Pant, and Shreyas Iyer, Gill is the sixth youngest captain in IPL history.

India's T20I captain Hardik Pandya on Sunday returned to his spiritual home Mumbai Indians after an all-cash deal trade-off with Gujarat Titans was formally completed following 72 hours of intense drama.

On Sunday at 5 pm, the IPL retention window was closed and at that point, Gujarat Titans named their IPL winning captain in the retention list raising a lot of eyebrows.

However, it was learned that the formal paperwork wasn't yet completed and hence IPL and BCCI didn't give the green light of approval for the most anticipated move of this transfer season.

"Yes, Hardik's trade-off was completed after 5 pm. The deal is now formalised and he is an MI player. It's been a tripartite all-cash deal. MI have traded their all-rounder Cameron Green to RCB in an all-cash deal.

"After that they had the requisite funds to settle an all-cash deal with Gujarat Titans and procure Hardik's services," a senior BCCI official and IPL Governing Council member told PTI on conditions of anonymity.

It must be mentioned that Green was bought by MI for a whopping Rs 17.5 crore during the last auction and hence the money required to buy Hardik wasn't available till that deal was inked.

Pandya was picked by Gujarat Titans before the 2022 auction from the list of available players for the two new franchises GT and Lucknow Super Giants. His reported fee was Rs 15 crore and he led the side to back-to-back finals, winning the championship in his maiden year and losing a thriller to CSK in 2023.

Mumbai Indians, who have one of the most systematic team-building processes, have roped in Pandya with a long-term plan in mind as there will be a mega auction in 2025 and every franchise will try to build a new team with a young core.

However with India's ODI and Test captain Rohit Sharma still very much in the mix and perhaps the franchise's biggest icon with five titles under his belt, it would be interesting what kind of decision the owners and top management with regards to leadership.

This must be mentioned that those in the know of things had an inkling that Pandya after two years at Titans wanted to move back to the franchise from where he had made a name and played seven seasons. The lure of captaining IPL's most popular franchise with biggest fan base was also a reason apart from building his brand as a national skipper in one of the formats.