The Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) have just lately named Ajinkya Rahane as their captain for the IPL 2025 season, with Venkatesh Iyer serving as vice-captain. This resolution has sparked discussions amongst followers and analysts, significantly given Iyer’s record-breaking public sale worth and his expressed curiosity in main the group. Forward of the upcoming season of the cash-rich league, KKR CEO Venky Mysore just lately make clear the reasoning behind the franchise’s selection.
Venky Mysore explains why Ajinkya Rahane was appointed as captain
Rahane, a seasoned cricketer with intensive management expertise, was seen as the best candidate to information KKR by way of the high-pressure IPL season. Rahane has beforehand captained India in Check cricket, most notably main the group to a historic sequence victory in Australia in the course of the 2020/21 Border-Gavaskar Trophy. Moreover, he has captained IPL groups like Rajasthan Royals as properly.
Additional, in home cricket, Rahane has been in stellar type, main Mumbai to titles in each the Irani Cup and Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy. His performances in T20s have been distinctive, scoring 469 runs in eight innings in the course of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy at a mean of 58.62 and a strike charge of 164.56. These accomplishments underscore his capability to steer by instance on and off the sphere.
“It takes a really regular hand, takes a variety of maturity and expertise, which we felt Ajinkya brings with him. He has performed 185 IPL video games, 200 worldwide video games throughout codecs. He has led India, led Mumbai in home, he’s led in IPL. And he has performed from season one among IPL. All that’s large. There must be no shock in any respect. From that perspective, we’re fortunate we’ve bought Ajinkya, who can be terrific for us. Not solely as solely as a captain, of which there’s little question, but additionally as a batsman. He has scored tons of runs,” mentioned Mysore as quoted by ESPNcricinfo.
Additionally READ: From Sourav Ganguly to Ajinkya Rahane: Full list of KKR captains in IPL history
Why Venkatesh Iyer was not given captaincy position?
Venkatesh, who was KKR’s most costly purchase at INR 23.75 crore in the course of the IPL 2025 mega public sale, had brazenly expressed his willingness to tackle the captaincy position. Nevertheless, Mysore clarified that whereas Iyer is extremely valued by the franchise and possesses management potential, they needed to make sure that he may deal with his sport with out the added stress of captaincy.
“IPL is kind of an intense event. Clearly, we expect very properly of Venkatesh Iyer, however on the similar time, it [captaincy] is taxing on a teenager. We now have seen plenty of folks having plenty of challenges with it [handling captaincy] as they go ahead,” added Mysore.
