Star opener Shubman Gill expressed his happiness after being announced as the captain of the Gujarat Titans (GT) ahead of the 17th season of the Indian Premier League (IPL). Speaking in a video of the Gujarat-based franchise, the 24-year-old was asked how he was feeling after being announced the skipper of the IPL 2022 champions, he replied that it would take one game to sink in that emotion.
“It’s going to take probably till the time we don’t play the first match, it’s not going to quite sink in. It’s a great feeling. I was about 7 or 8 years old when IPL started. Obviously, it’s a dream for any kid who wants to be a cricketer and who wants to play in the IPL to be able to captain a team, that kind of binding factor in this team. It feels amazing,” Gill said.
When asked about captaincy, GT’s new skipper said that it takes a lot of commitment, discipline, hard work, and loyalty to lead a team. He added that there would be a lot of new learnings that would help him to gain experience as a captain. “We all know captainship comes with a lot of things and commitment is one of them, discipline is one of them, hard work is one of them, and loyalty is one of them. And because I have played under great leaders and I have learnt a lot from them I think those learnings that I have had from their experience playing under them will help me a lot in this IPL. We have great leaders in our team, be it Kane [Williamson], or be it Rashid [Khan], or be it [Mohammed] Shami or even David [Miller] and Wriddhiman [Saha] so it’s going to be great. Obviously, there will be a lot of learnings along the way which is what experience is and which will be my experience as a captain. I see a lot of people making great memories,” he concluded.
After Hardik Pandya went back to Mumbai Indians earlier on Monday, the ‘Little Prince’ of Ahmedabad was handed the captaincy duties. Gill has amassed 1373 runs in 33 innings at an average of 47.34, with three centuries and eight fifties. Last season was monumental for the opener as he slammed 890 runs in 17 matches at an average of 59.33, with three centuries and four fifties and was also named Orange Cap winner.
