IPL History: 4 players unlucky to play for Mumbai Indians in the IPL
Mumbai Indians are one of the most successful teams in IPL history. They have managed to reach the IPL final four times in the 11 seasons, and they are also the first team to win three IPL trophies - a feat subsequently matched only by the formidable Chennai Super Kings, when they won last year's tournament.
That means whoever among these two teams wins the upcoming season, would get the unequaled top spot in the leaderboard.
Mumbai won their first ever tournament against CSK in the 2013 season, and then in 2015 against same opponents. In the 2017 final, they beat Rising Pune Supergiant by one run to win their third title. Rohit Sharma led them in all these three epic journeys.
Mumbai have been blessed to have many great cricketers over the years, including legends like Sachin Tendulkar and Sanath Jayasuriya, who used to open for them in the early days. Then came Rohit Sharma, who has been captaining them since the 2013 season.
Kieron Pollard has been delivering consistent all-round performances for many years. Lasith Malinga meanwhile took care of the death bowling for quite a while.
However, there are some talented players who didn't get opportunities when they were in the Mumbai set-up, mainly due to the presence of so many legends in the team. Here, we take a look at four such unlucky players:
#4 Yuzvendra Chahal
Yuzvendra Chahal is currently India's front-line spinner. He is likely to grab a spot in the World Cup 2019 too. But did you know that he had played for Mumbai Indians from the 2011 season to the 2013 one?
Chahal was not in the limelight during that time. He got to play only four matches in the three seasons he was with the team.
One of the primary reasons for that was that Mumbai already had the veteran Indian off- spinner Harbhajan Singh in the team. It was hard for any captain to choose the new unproven youngster instead of an experienced player like Harbhajan.
Maybe if Chahal had gotten the opportunity earlier, he might have shown his skills and could have become a regular in the set-up for Mumbai. Instead, the leg-spinner moved to Royal Challengers Bangalore, and that's when his career changed.