Sunrisers Hyderabad coach Daniel Vettori lauded Ishan Kishan and said that the team management had little hesitation in appointing the Jharkhand player the captaincy after regular skipper Pat Cummins was set to miss the initial stages of the Indian Premier League (IPL) season.
βI think Ishanβs been around in the IPL for a long period of time now. Heβs been with a number of teams and heβs been highly successful, so, he brings in his own confidence around that. The fact that heβs led the U19s and his state team and they won the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy this year brings a confident person, a confident player and a really confident leader and those are the attributes that we really looked at when he was appointed. His combination with Abhishek, theyβre good friends, they know the team exceptionally well and I really feel like those two will lead from the front this season,β Vettori said in the pre-match press meet on Friday.
βI think he started last year where he was added a senior player to the group and the leadership that he exuded throughout that first season, particularly in the back half when he took over the wicketkeeping, it really brought energy to the group and set up our back half of the year and we were pretty successful in that period. So when Pat (Cummins) was unfortunately out of the initial stage of the tournament, we had some decisions to make and his (Kishanβs) experience with his state team in particular had been so impressive and then he was in really good form. So, between Abhishek and himself, we feel like weβve got a really good leadership group to lead us this year,β Vettori said.
SRH will start their IPL 2026 season against defending champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru on Saturday without Cummins and Vettori revealed when the Australian, who has already joined the squad, can play.