All eyes will be on the fitness of Hardik Pandya, who is set to captain the Gujarat Titans team as the new franchise debuts in the Indian Premier League 2022. Due to a lower back injury, the star Indian all-rounder is yet to play any competitive match post the ICC T20 World Cup 2021 in UAE which got over in November 2021. According to Gujarat Titans’ spin bowling coach Aashish Kapoor, Pandya has begun practice and even started to bowl in the nets.

“Last two months I have been in Bahrain, I was coaching the National team over there. So, Nehra has been in constant touch with him from the time we have retained him and Nehra has been talking to him. He has also spoken about how to arrange and where to arrange practice sessions for him and get those things done,” Gujarat Titans’ spin bowling coach Aashish Kapoor told ANI.

“Asking him to play a few Ranji Trophy games before he turns up for a camp which may be in March with some point in March may be in Mid-March. So, he has been also starting to bowl that’s what he has told Nehra. He has started to bowl, he is bowling well and batting he has no problems in any case because mainly we want to know whether he can bowl for us like how in the Indian team.”

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“So, if he can bowl and bat both it is an added advantage because there are not too many all-rounders in India (medium pace all-rounders). He is the only one that you can think of at the moment so if you have that all-rounder with you then I think you are on the plus side,” Kapoor said.

Pandya did not bowl much in IPL 2021 for Mumbai and he even did not bowl much for India in ICC T20 World Cup 2021 due to injury. Pandya’s contribution to his franchise as both batter and bowler will give his team management more options and certainly will add variety to the bowling attack.