Hardik Pandya and MS Dhoni share a great bonding. And former cricketer Sanjay Manjrekar was reminded of Dhoni while seeing Pandya captaining the Gujarat Titans (GT), arranging his field, and making appropriate bowling adjustments during the IPL 2022 Final on May 29.

Pandya not only put outstanding field placements against RR in the IPL Final on Sunday night, but he also led from the front with a magnificent bowling stint (3-17) with wickets of Sanju Samson, Jos Buttler, and Shimron Hetmyer, as RR was restricted to 130/9.

“Hardik Pandya bowled well. In batting too, he batted in all gears while playing at the crucial No.4 spot. He captained the team like MS Dhoni. R Sai Kishore bowled the 16th and 18th overs in the final," Manjrekar told ESPNcricinfo.

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“His captaincy was similar to MS Dhoni’s, as he made the decisions according to match situations. He seems to be enjoying the captaincy and looks very relaxed," he further added.

In addition, Pandya has the same number of IPL titles as Dhoni. Pandya, who had previously won the trophy four times with Mumbai (in 2015, 2017, 2019, and 2020), won it with Gujarat Titans, this time as captain, surpassing MS Dhoni's four trophies- (2010), (2011), (2018), and 2021) all coming as CSK captain.

Hardik Pandya is also the third captain in IPL history to win the Man of the final award, following the likes of matching Anil Kumble and Rohit Sharma.