Aiden Markram's 3 biggest captaincy mistakes in IPL 2023

Aiden Markram made his Indian Premier League (IPL) captaincy debut this season.

The South African star had a lot of leadership experience under his belt prior to IPL 2023. He has led South Africa in a few international matches and also guided the Sunrisers Eastern Cape to their maiden SA20 title earlier this year.

His brilliant captaincy in SA20 led to the Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) team owners appointing him as their skipper for IPL 2023. SRH were poor over the last two seasons, finishing in the bottom half of the points table. Aiden Markram was assigned the responsibility to bring glory back to the SRH team.

However, most would argue that Markram has not lived up to expectations in his debut season as the Sunrisers' captain. After joining the team late because of national duty, Markram has led SRH in 11 matches so far, with the team recording four wins and seven losses.

The Sunrisers Hyderabad still have to play two matches in the league stage of IPL 2023, but they have already been eliminated from the race to the playoffs.

It remains to be seen if Aiden Markram will continue as SRH's captain in IPL 2024 despite his failures this season. On that note, here's a list of the three big mistakes he made as Hyderabad skipper which he will not want to repeat next season.

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#1 Aiden Markram made too many changes to his team's playing XI

Constant chopping and changing does not help any team as it stops the team from building consistency.

However, the Sunrisers Hyderabad have simply not settled on a consistent starting line-up. As the captain, Aiden Markram is a part of the group that decides the playing XI, and he will be keen to stick with the same playing XI for a majority of the matches next season.

Teams like the Gujarat Titans and Chennai Super Kings, who currently occupy the top two spots in the table, rarely change their playing XIs. Unless their hands were forced by injuries or the pitch being too supportive for a particular type of benched player, neither the Titans nor the Super Kings made changes to their XIs.

SRH, meanwhile, have tried 20 players in 12 matches with little success. Markram should aim to use a lesser number of players next season.

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#2 Not preparing pace-friendly pitches in Hyderabad

The home-and-away format returned in IPL 2023 after a couple of seasons held in bubbles due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Every team gets an opportunity to play half of their league stage matches at home. If they win their seven home matches or at least a sizeable portion of those games, they are likely to finish in the upper half of the standings.

The home team can ask for a certain type of pitch if they want. However, it seems as though Aiden Markram and SRH haven't provided the right inputs for the wicket preparation.

The Sunrisers, as a result, have managed only one win in six home matches so far, though Markram's tactics in some of those games also need to be questioned. He could not get the team to adapt to the conditions they were dealt either.

Regardless, pace is SRH's main strength in the bowling department. They can even afford to bowl 20 overs of pace in an innings, given the ability of Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Marco Jansen, T Natarajan and Umran Malik.

A pace-friendly wicket in Hyderabad could have helped SRH a lot, but the surface has hardly assisted pace in the six games played on it this season.

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#3 Aiden Markram did not use his available resources to perfection

SRH's team management did a fantastic job at the auction by signing top T20 stars like Adil Rashid, Akeal Hosein, Harry Brook and Mayank Agarwal. Hyderabad were even viewed as dark horses to mount a title challenge in IPL 2023 by some fans.

However, Aiden Markram and the coaches could not use their available resources to perfection. Brook and Agarwal are no longer in the XI, while Rashid and Hosein have essentially not been used at all.

Irfan Pathan even pointed out how Umran Malik, who had a breakout campaign last season, has not been handled well by the franchise this time around.

When the season ends, Markram should try to look back and understand how he missed out on opportunities to use the world-class players he had in his squad. The analysis could help him and SRH achieve better results in IPL 2024.