Former Indian bowler Praveen Kumar has torn into Hardik Pandya for playing in the IPL and earning big money quickly rather than playing for the Indian cricket team.
Hardik Pandya has become a target for the fans as well as for some former cricketers, who are questioning his loyalties to the Indian cricket team. The latest scathing attack came from Praveen Kumar, just a day after the 30-year-old all-rounder joined the Mumbai Indians camp ahead of the start of IPL 2024. Praveen made some serious allegations that Pandya has the habit of getting injured 2 months before the start of every IPL season and doesn’t bother to play for the domestic team, Baroda, or for his country as he has his mind fixed only on earning big paycheck from his participation in the league.
What Praveen Kumar Said:
“You get injured two months before the IPL, you don’t play for the country, you don’t play for your state in domestic cricket, and just directly play in the IPL. That’s not how things should be done. It’s okay to earn money, there’s nothing wrong with that. But you have to play for state and country and now people only give importance to the IPL)”, Praveen said.
This was not the 1st time that Hardik Pandya was the focal point of some serious allegations from the cricket fraternity. Former star all-rounder Irfan Pathan also questioned Pandya’s aspirations towards donning the Indian shirt.
Read More: BCCI Declares Rishabh Pant Fit to Play in IPL 2024
The veteran all-rounder questioned why BCCI treated Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan differently than Hardik Pandya. For the uninitiated, both Iyer and Kishan lost BCCI’s central contracts due to favoring IPL over domestic cricket and test cricket.
“They are talented cricketers, both Shreyas and Ishan. Hoping they bounce back and come back stronger. If players like Hardik don’t want to play red-ball cricket, should he and others like him participate in white-ball domestic cricket when they aren’t on national duty? If this doesn’t apply to all, then Indian cricket won’t achieve the desired results,” Pathan wrote.
