Gujarat Titans captain Shubman Gill missed a match for the franchise for the first time in four years on Saturday (April 4). Rashid Khan stood in for Gill against the Rajasthan Royals and said that the regular
skipper was suffering from a ‘muscle spasm’ and could be back soon.
After Kolkata Knight Riders released him, the Titans had the opportunity to pick players from the auction lot before their first season in the league in 2022. Gill was among their first choices for Rs. 8 crore, and he played 61 matches on the trot, scoring 2488 runs at an average of 46.07 and a strike-rate of 149.70.
Now, only Rashid and all-rounder Rahul Tewatia have played each of the 62 matches for Titans.
“Well, we wanted to bowl first as well. Fresh wicket and I feel like there will be some help for the bowlers initially, but we are quite happy with the toss so far,” Rashid said at the toss.
“Gill has got bit of a muscle spasm, hopefully he will be back soon. KK (Kumar Kushagra) is playing his first game and look forward to see him play. I think we played good cricket (in the last game). I feel in the last game as well, it was a very close game, but some of the areas we need to improve our bowling and also with the batting. And we spoke a lot about that in the meetings and we just need to bring our A-game here and give our 100%. So I feel like we did really well in the last game as well, but we take the positive things from that and we keep improving our skills in our game,” he added.
Rashid Khan has led the spin attack, taking 66 wickets across his first four seasons. He has also contributed 363 runs as a lower-order batter.
Tewatia has primarily served as a specialist finisher for the Titans. Over his first four seasons and the start of the 2026 campaign, Tewatia has scored over six hundred runs for Gujarat, while barely bowling.
