Mumbai Indians' ₹16.35 crore player posts special Instagram story for Ashwani Kumar after his 4/24 on IPL debut [Photo]

Mumbai Indians debutant Ashwani Kumar won the Man of the Match award for his dream spell of 4/24 in the IPL 2025 game against the Kolkata Knight Riders. The Mumbai-based franchise surprised KKR by giving a game to uncapped pacer Kumar, and he delivered the goods straightaway.

During his three-over spell, the debutant picked up the wickets of Ajinkya Rahane, Rinku Singh, Manish Pandey, and Andre Russell. His bowling performance impressed every member of the Mumbai Indians team, including the team's ₹16.35 crore player Hardik Pandya.

Soon after the match between MI and KKR ended, Pandya took to Instagram and posted a special Instagram story for his team's newest star Ashwani Kumar. He tagged Kumar's official Instagram profile and wrote:

"Outstanding."

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Pandya also posted some other photos from the match against the Kolkata Knight Riders on Instagram after his team's eight-wicket win. The MI skipper wrote that it was great to be back at the Wankhede Stadium.

Can Ashwani Kumar continue his top form against the Lucknow Super Giants in IPL 2025?

Mumbai Indians will soon board a flight to Lucknow and start practicing at the Bharat Ratna Shree Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Stadium for their next fixture against the Lucknow Super Giants on Friday, April 4. It will be the third away game for MI, who suffered a loss in both of their previous away fixtures.

MI started their season with a defeat at the hands of the Chennai Super Kings at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai. After that, the Indians reached the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, where Shubman Gill's Gujarat Titans defeated them easily.

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It is pertinent to note that Ashwani Kumar did not play in any of those two games. It will be exciting to see if the new fast bowler can help MI snap their losing streak in away matches of IPL 2025.

About the author

Vinay has been working as a cricket journalist at Sportskeeda since 2018. A veteran writer, he has a total previous work experience of 8 years working for the likes of Swag Cricket and Fambeat, and believes in thoroughly verifying each and every piece of information before writing any article. His meticulous methods have led him to amass a significant readership of close to 30 million at Sportskeeda, along with winning several awards such as Machine Writer, Top Earning Affiliate, and Perfectionist Writer in his Sportskeeda journey so far.

Vinay’s love for cricket blossomed when playing the sport during school days. Today, he is a staunch supporter of his home IPL side Gujarat Titans and is also the ambassador of franchise’s initiative Race with the Titans. Unsurprisingly, his all-time favorite cricketers also feature from his favorite IPL franchise - Rashid Khan, Matthew Wade, Sai Sudharsan and Shubman Gill.

When not writing, Vinay likes to play cricket and hang out with his friends. Being an industry veteran, his influence goes beyond the sport of cricket and has interviewed several Kabaddi stars such as Mohammad Nabibakhsh, Daniel Odhiambo, Vijay Malik, and Girish Ernak as well. He also is a fan of professional wrestling.

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Edited by Yash Singh