Mumbai Indians coach Mahela Jayawardene Told How He Will Scout New Players For IPL 2021 Amid Pandemic

Mumbai Indians head coach Mahela Jayawardene has said that since the pandemic has made things difficult for the franchise to do regular scouting, they will look towards trading windows to fill any gaps they have in the coming year.

"Usually we have time to do our camps and go through the scouting and find new talented players and see new areas to improve in the squad. But unfortunately, with the pandemic we don't have that much time to do that much planning. I think India is pretty much under lockdown," said Jayawardene while speaking on Sky Sports.

"We are still unsure about whether we will have small or big auction. We keep in touch with owners and franchises over 12 months. Fortunately, we have two-three trading windows so we will see how we can boost our squad and do stuff, because every year you need to develop and have different options," he added.

Jayawardene explained that he had talked to the players ahead of the tournament to break the jinx of not winning a tournament in odd years.

"There was some pressure, we weren't winning even years. We kept winning in odd years, so that was a bit of a challenge. So that was something that I put down on the board for the guys at the beginning of the season as a challenge that we need to do this and try and focus on that. But we never had that thing that we have to win it," said Jayawardene.

The Sri Lankan said that the first hurdle was to qualify for the play-offs as IPL is full of uncertainties with teams making comebacks.

"The first hurdle was to qualify because in IPL the toughest thing is to qualify for the playoffs, you know. You'll never know because lots of teams make those late charges and stuff like that and to try and be the top two teams gives you that cushion. So those are the things and once we got there. There was a little bit of pressure but the experience in our camp, we handled it well," Jayawardene said.