Baroda all-rounder and Hardik Pandya's elder brother Krunal Pandya has been on a roller coaster of late. He had to undergo the grief of his father passing away in January this year and then was called up in the Indian ODI team. The elder Pandya is 30 years old and has been producing the goods for Mumbai Indians since 2016. He has scored 10000 runs from 71 IPL matches at an average of 25 and a strike rate of 142.45. Pandya's best season with the bat came in IPL 2016 when he scored 237 runs at an average of 39.50 and a strike rate of 191.12. With the ball, he has picked up 46 wickets at an average of 32.8. What is impressive though is that he has an economy rate of 7.26 which is quite impressive for a left arm spinner who does not have any mystery about him. His best season with the ball in IPL came in 2018 when he picked up 12 wickets at an average of 23.66 and an economy rate of 7.07. Before Pandya was called up in the Indian national team, he did some great things for Baroda in domestic Cricket. After a couple of great knocks, he had to leave the bio secure bubble during the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy to be part of his father's funeral. He then returned in the Vijay Hazare Trophy where he was right on the money and struck 388 runs from five innings at an average of 129.33 and a strike rate of 117.93, apart from doing his job with the ball. He struck two 100s as well which led to an India call up. It would have been difficult for Krunal Pandya to make the cut had RavindraJadeja not been injured. As fate would have it, Jadeja was injured and Team India wanted to try someone else after Axar Patel stamped his authority in the test matches. What gave Pandya the nod was his ability with the bat as India was looking at a talented batsman at number 7 and they found the match in Krunal Pandya. While the Mumbai Indians core player could not impress with the ball, Pandya scored a half-century in International cricket on debut as he raced to an unbeaten 58 and did his reputation no harm.
