Sunrisers Hyderabad, SRH as they call it, has played under the captaincy of 7 different captains since their inception.
Generally, when a team changes too many captains, you would think they would be highly inconsistent, but that’s not the case with SRH. They have not only won a title in the last 5 years, they have been runners up once and have reached the playoffs thrice as well. So, despite changing various different captains at various stages for various different reasons, Sunrisers Hyderabad hasn’t let their performance suffer.
Here are the 7 different captains Sunrisers Hyderabad has played under –
1 Kumar Sangakkara and Cameron White (2013)
When the ownership of the Hyderabad franchise changed hands in 2013 and the name was also changed from Deccan Chargers to Sunrisers Hyderabad, it was Kumar Sangakkara who took charge of the team first. But, he had to go back to national duty mid-way through the season and it was the Aussie all-rounder Cameron White who captained the team for the rest of the season.
2 Shikhar Dhawan and Darren Sammy (2014)
Because of continuous doubts over the participation of the overseas players for the full length of the tournament, the franchise went for an Indian captain for the 2014 season and Shikhar Dhawan was given the captaincy of an IPL team for the first time in his career.
But, Dhawan didn’t prove to be as successful as a captain as he was expected to and eventually, he was sacked in the middle of the season. Surprisingly, the captaincy was given to Darren Sammy who was an overseas player again. Although Sammy was going to be available for the rest of the games, his place in the playing XI was uncertain.
3 David Warner (2015-17)
There was a new captain announced in the form of David Warner ahead of the start of IPL 2015 and he was another overseas player, but the good thing about Warner was that he was an absolute certainty in the playing XI of SRH and was the first name on paper before anyone else.
SRH’s performance improved significantly under the captaincy of Warner and it was during that period of 2015 to 2017 that SRH played some of their best cricket ever. They even won an IPL title during that phase in 2016 to be precise.
4 Kane Williamson and Bhuvneshwar Kumar (2018-19)
Warner was going to continue as the SRH captain in 2018 as well if it was not for a 12-month ban that was imposed on him for the ball tampering sacndal in South Africa. However, because of the ban, the captaincy was changed again and Kane Williamson took over as captain ahead of IPL 2018.
Williamson captained the team excellently in Warner’s absence and led the team to the final of the tournament where they were beaten by Chennai Super Kings.
Even after Warner’s return in IPL 2019, Williamson continued as SRH captain and when he was injured for a few games, it was Bhuvneshwar Kumar who discharged the captaincy duties as he was the designated vice-captain of the side.
5 David Warner (2020)
Even though SRH made the playoffs in IPL 2019, their performance was not particularly good as they won only 6 out of their 14 games in the preliminary round and it was one of those rare seasons where a team qualified to the playoffs despite winning just 6 games.
However, the SRH management decided to re-instate Warner as captain of the team again before coming into IPL 2020 and the Aussie opener is currently in charge of the SRH squad.
