Aakash Chopra picks his all-time Mumbai Indians XI, chooses Rohit Sharma as the skipper over Sachin Tendulkar

Cricketer-turned-commentator Aakash Chopra has been quite active on social media amid his quarantine period. The former India opener has never shied away from expressing his opinions on social media. Chopra, like many others, has shared many ‘All-time XI’ since the past couple of months.

Chopra has now picked his all-time XI of Mumbai Indians in which he assigned the skipper’s role to Rohit Sharma instead of Sachin Tendulkar. Considering the impressive captaincy record of Rohit, it was an obvious choice for Chopra. Tendulkar led MI to 32 wins in 55 matches at a winning percentage of 58.18.

Rohit, who has captained MI to 64 wins in 109 matches. However, it’s the silverware which sets Rohit apart from Tendulkar. Rohit is the leading run-scorer for the franchise with 3728 runs in 143 matches and has steered the franchise to four IPL trophies.

Chopra picked Tendulkar and Sanath Jayasuriya as two openers of his squad and slotted Rohit at the No.3 position. Following Rohit, Chopra picked wicketkeeper-batsman Ambati Rayudu and Kieron Pollard to come in at No.4 and No.5 respectively. Rayudu spent eight years in MI before moving to Chennai Super Kings in 2018. Pollard, on the other hand, has been an indispensable part of the Mumbai franchise since joining them in 2010.

Aakash Chopra picked Pandya brothers as the two all-rounders

Hardik Pandya and Krunal Pandya were the two all-rounders in Chopra’s squad. The Pandya brothers achieved new heights after being picked by Mumbai Indians. Hardik has scored 1068 runs in 66 matches and he has scalped 42 wickets. On the other hand, Krunal has 891 runs in 55 matches and he has snared 40 wickets.

Coming on to the spin department, Chopra picked Harbhajan Singh as the solitary spinner of the squad. The India veteran spent 10 years at MI before shifting his base to CSK. While donning the Mumbai Indians jersey, Harbhajan took 127 wickets in 136 matches

To finish things off, Chopra picked the pace trio of Jasprit Bumrah (82 wickets), Lasith Malinga (170 wickets) and Zaheer Khan (26 wickets) to boast MI’s star-studded squad.

Aakash Chopra’s all-time Mumbai Indians’ XI: Sachin Tendulkar, Sanath Jayasuriya, Rohit Sharma (Captain), Ambati Rayudu (WK), Kieron Pollard, Krunal Pandya, Hardik Pandya, Harbhajan Singh, Jasprit Bumrah, Lasith Malinga, Zaheer Khan