Mumbai Indians (MI) is one of the few teams whose success is comparable to that of MI in franchise cricket. No doubt, they have five IPL trophies, two Champions League titles, and many more victories.
And this was only possible by good leaders, and the franchise luckly had such leaders. The iconic Sachin Tendulkar, the Hitman Rohit Sharma, and others have been among the great leaders of the team in its past.
We are going to mention the names of all the captains who have led the Mumbai Indians in the IPL.
List of Captains for Mumbai Indians in IPL History
1. Sachin Tendulkar
MI caught the attention of the people by signing the favorite local player Sachin Tendulkar before the opening IPL season started. He became the franchise’s face to attract a crowd to Wankhede Stadium.
Tendulkar also captained the team for four years starting from 2008 to 2011. MI just about missed out on the playoffs in 2008 and had a poor season in 2009 but he led them to subsequent playoffs in the following two editions.
Tendulkar was the standout performer along with MI which was under his captaincy. The Mumbai batsman was, in fact, the Orange Cap holder in 2010.
Overall, Tendulkar captained MI for 51 matches with 30 wins achieving a win percentage of 58.82.
2. Harbhajan Singh
MI had Tendulkar as captain going into 2008 but he was not available due to injuries for the first half of the season. Harbhajan Singh in this way started leading MI taking charge of their first-ever IPL game on April 20, 2008.
The former Indian off-spinner had an unlucky start as a captain with three consecutive losses. He would have led in a couple more games that season but the “slapgate” incident led him to a suspension for the year.
However, four seasons after that, Harbhajan replaced Tendulkar as MI’s full captain. He led the team well during the IPL 2012.
Mumbai made it to the playoffs three times in a row, although the team went out in the Eliminator. Yet, MI didn’t keep Harbhajan as captain for the 2013 edition.
Harbhajan had a 50-50 record as MI skipper with 10 wins and 10 losses out of 20 games.
3. Shaun Pollock
In the middle of Harbhajan and Tendulkar, South African Shaun Pollock had a chance to lead the team in IPL. Though it was a little quick, the all-rounder let MI return to the right path in the first season.
In the four matches, Pollock had an enormous impact on the team where he was the captain. Out of the four games under his captaincy, MI won three.
4. Dwayne Bravo
This might sound unbelievable; Dwayne Bravo was the captain of MI in 2010. However, this only happened once during his whole career as a captain.
The West Indian all-rounder took over when Tendulkar was not available during a match in the league against Kolkata Knight Riders. This was the only game during the league in which Bravo was the captain, and although it ended in a loss for him as well as MI, he tried hard.
5. Ricky Ponting
Perhaps everyone already knows the great captaincy record of Ricky Ponting in international cricket – over 200 wins, two World Cups, and many more, all while leading Australia. But he could not completely translate the same success to the IPL.
MI purchased Ponting ahead of the 2013 season and gave him the captaincy. After six games into the season, the former Australian skipper resigned.
The team’s performance was mixed under Ponting, with three victories and the same number of losses, but the captaincy issue somewhat affected his personal performance.
6. Rohit Sharma
The mid-season departure of Ponting opened up the way for MI to be crowned the IPL champions. He transferred the captaincy to Rohit Sharma, which was a stroke of genius.
Many might not have considered MI capable of lifting the IPL 2013 trophy after the captaincy switch. But Sharma was very diplomatic in the handling of the transition.
His serene and strategic leadership brought the first IPL trophy to Mumbai in the same season. MI later added five more trophies to their collection under his command, among them the 2013 Champions League T20.
Sharma’s decade-long captaincy saw him evolve into one of the league’s most successful leaders. He recorded 89 wins in 158 matches with a win percentage of 56.32.
7. Kieron Pollard
The importance of Kieron Pollard to MI’s victory is really enormous. He was the team’s most valuable player that no other player could ever replace and he produced many crucial performances over the years.
Pollard virtually came close to being the captain of the team in the IPL. He was the one who wore the crown of captaincy whenever Sharma was absent in the six matches from 2019 to 2021. And his short period of being a captain was an important factor in MI winning the trophies in 2019 and 2020.
The daring decision of Pollard as a captain resulted in MI winning four out of the six games.
8. Suryakumar Yadav
Suryakumar Yadav became the T20I captain of India after Sharma while he did not get a chance in the IPL. The aggressive batter has captained MI twice so far.
The first instance was in Sharma’s absence in the year 2023, and the second instance was when he took over Hardik Pandya’s position in 2025.
Suryakumar would probably like to have a prolonged period as a captain; he has proved his captaincy skill in the short duration.
Read Also:- Complete List of Delhi Capitals Captains
9. Hardik Pandya
In a drastic shift, MI decided to remove Sharma from captaincy and gave the responsibility of leading the team to Hardik Pandya in 2024. The Indian all-rounder was with the squad from 2015 to 2021 before moving to Gujarat Titans (GT) in 2022. But, Pandya came back to MI as a title-winning skipper and straightaway was handed the captaincy duty.
The move, however, was not well taken, as MI experienced one of their worst IPL seasons. Mumbai ended up at the bottom with a mere four wins.
But the team seems to have accepted Pandya’s leadership as they have made a tremendous comeback in 2025 just like a true champion.
