Mumbai Indians address Hardik Pandya absence amid rumours of unfollowing franchise: 'Hardik had a...'

Mumbai Indians head coach Mahela Jayawardene has finally broken the silence on captain Hardik Pandya's conspicuous absence from the team for the last two IPL 2026 matches. Suryakumar Yadav has been captaining MI in Hardik's absence.

Mumbai Indians suffered a two-wicket defeat to Royal Challengers Bengaluru in Raipur on Sunday as they were eliminated from the ongoing IPL. After finishing at the bottom in 2023, the Mumbai Indians reached the playoffs last season and were hoping for a much better season, but things have gone south once again.

Why Hardik is not playing for Mumbai Indians?

Pandya's absence has added more mystery to their poor performance as news started circulating that all is not well in the MI camp and that the captain has unfollowed the team on Instagram. But that's untrue as Pandya is still following the Mumbai Indians.

Meanwhile, Jayawardene has revealed that Pandya was missing out due to a back issue.

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"Yeah. Hardik had a back issue which we were trying to rectify, but it hasn't settled in yet. So the medical guys were working on him. He couldn't train the last few days, so we didn't want to take a risk without knowing exactly. So we'll see. It's on a day-to-day basis. See how he feels. And then we'll make a decision on that," Jayawardene said.

On Mumbai's another disappointing season and early exit, the coach said: "The season is disappointing. We've had our opportunities, but we were not good enough. We were not consistent enough with the ball or the bat, and that showed in the margins. We were probably two or three wins away from being in the same group of contenders to get into the playoffs, but we didn't get those wins, and today was another classic example where we fell short."

MI still have three matches to go in the season, and it will be interesting to see whether Hardik features again for them or not. There are rumours that he could be released to make way for a new captain.