Sunrisers Hyderabad has appointed South African Aiden Markram as the captain of the team for the upcoming season of the Indian Premier League (IPL). Markram is the captain of Hyderabad franchise team Sunrisers Eastern Cape in South Africa's T20 League SAT20 (SA20). He made the team champion in the first season of SAT20. His reward has been given to him by the franchise and handed over the captaincy of the IPL team.

Sunrisers Hyderabad dropped captain Kane Williamson from the team ahead of the IPL auction in December last year. Williamson was retained by the franchise ahead of the mega auction earlier last year. He could not perform well in the tournament and the Sunrisers team could not even reach the playoffs. The team was ranked eighth in the IPL. He didn't even play in the last match of the team last year. Bhuvneshwar Kumar captained in his place.

It was believed that the Sunrisers Hyderabad team would make one of Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Aiden Markram and Mayank Agarwal the captain. Bhuvneshwar has been associated with the team since 2013. Mayank was bought by the team in December last year for Rs 8.25 crore. He captained the Punjab Kings in the IPL last year. In such a situation, looking at his experience, it seemed that he could become the captain, but the franchise has reposed faith in Markram.

Looking at Markram's performance in SAT20, he scored 369 runs in 12 matches at a strike rate of 127. He also scored a century. Markram also did wonders in bowling. He took 11 wickets at an economy rate of 6.19. Sunrisers Hyderabad bought Markram for Rs 2.6 crore in the mega auction last year. He scored 381 runs in 12 innings in IPL at a strike rate of 139.05.