Even in a bleak situation, Mumbai Indians, which is already eliminated from the IPL 2026 playoff race, is staying positive while looking to complete its engagements.

On the eve of MI’s return leg match against Kolkata Knight Riders at the Eden Gardens here, touring batter Naman Dhir opened up about his team’s culture.

“Motivation is the fans. We are made for the fans. Whenever our team goes into the ground, we go for the win. We will try to play our best cricket, as well as [we played] in the last match [against Punjab Kings].

“Obviously, KKR will have better plans from [what it had in] the previous encounter, but we see ourselves as favourites.”

Naman said injuries to senior players was a reason behind the five-time champion’s struggles. “Rohit (Sharma) had a hamstring injury. Suryakumar Yadav had to go on paternity leave. Hardik was not there. Quinton (de Kock) got ruled out because of injury. We missed them in crucial matches. This was also a reason that we weren’t able to perform well. We are very sad this year that we didn’t give a trophy to our fans. Sometimes we did well in bowling, sometimes in batting. We couldn’t put in a lot of collective effort.”

Naman, however, did not see playing under three captains (Hardik, Suryakumar and Jasprit Bumrah) as a distraction. “When people talk about one family, the atmosphere is always like that. All the captains have different tactics. I enjoyed playing under everyone. So, I wouldn’t say it was disturbing,” said Naman.