New Delhi: When will it happen? Hardik Pandya Back to action? How is his injury? When will he return? These are the questions fans are asking after this. Mumbai Indians The captain could not miss his second consecutive match in IPL 2026. Mumbai Indians were without their regular captain for the second match in a row. Surya Kumar Yadav Leading the team in Hardik’s absence.Mumbai Indians head coach Mahila Jayawardene gave an important update on Pandya’s injury following MI’s two-wicket loss to Royal Challengers Bengaluru at the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh International Stadium in Raipur.
The defeat also confirmed five-time champions Mumbai Indians’ exit from the play-off race. MI became the second team after Lucknow Supergiants to be eliminated from the tournament.Speaking after the match, Jayawardene revealed that Hardik is dealing with a back problem and is currently undergoing treatment with the medical team.“Yes. Hardik had a back problem that we were trying to fix, but it’s not resolved yet. So the medical guys are working on it. He hasn’t been able to train for the past few days, so we didn’t want to take any risks without knowing exactly. So we’ll see. It’s on a day-to-day basis. See how he feels.” And then we said let them decide.Mumbai Indians have endured a poor IPL 2026 campaign so far, playing 11 matches, winning 3 and losing 8.Jayawardene knew that he would face tough questions in the post-match press conference.“The season has been disappointing. We had our chances, but we weren’t good enough. We weren’t consistent enough with the ball or with the bat, and it showed in the margins. We were maybe two or three wins away from being in the same group of play-off contenders, but we didn’t get that win, and today was another great example,” Sri Lanka said, adding that we played short.
