The most successful side in the IPL history, Mumbai Indians, have now created the record for the worst start by a team to an IPL season by losing their first 7 matches of IPL 2022 when they lost a last-ball thriller to Chennai Super Kings on Thursday night.
Former Mumbai Indians batsman Chris Lynn feels that Rohit Sharma’s unit is lacking the collectiveness than made them the best T20 team in the world in 2020. Lynn reckoned there are “factions” within the squad preventing MI to play as one team.
“They (Mumbai Indians) are starting to sort of break off into little groups and they just want to get off the field. And it’s not a great sign. And I think the change room right now wouldn’t be a great place to be in,” Chris Lynn told ESPNcricinfo.
“Winning is a habit and losing is a habit. They have got issues with the bat, with the ball, and in the field and mentally. It just seems like there are factions everywhere in the set-up.”
Chris Lynn played only one game across the 2020 and 2021 IPL seasons with Mumbai Indians. But, the Australian batter remembers the strength of the group and the conversations then, which don’t seem to be happening in the dressing room this season. He sees the current version of Mumbai Indians as 11 different individuals and not one solid team.
“Flip side of that, when they won the tournament two years ago, there were conversations happening all the time – how can we get better, how can we get out of the over. All those little organic conversations were happening without coaching staff telling them to do that because blokes were up and about wanting to win. So we are not seeing that, we are seeing the complete opposite: it seems like instead of a team of 11, there’s 11 individuals out there,” the former opener felt.
With 7 losses in as many matches, MI’s chances of reaching the playoffs are out of their hands and will need immense favour from other teams and luck. Although, for that, they need to themselves win their first game.
