MS Dhoni, going for the toss, for the first time this season, remained a massive moment for CSK supporters. From the beginning of the league, CSK faced hurdles this year, and it was the worst start ever, with four consecutive losses. The team’s overall performance was tremendously poor; in any perspective of the sport – be it batting, bowling, and fielding, the opposite teams were dominating them. So all they were saying was an overall reevaluation. Though they had managed two wins, things were pretty tough for them after losing six matches.
After eight matches, Jadeja was released from the burdens of captaincy, and team management thought to depend upon their time-tested reliable shoulder of Dhoni. After becoming the captain again, the SRH match was the first one. A splendid opening partnership by Gaikwad and Conway powered CSK to achieve a dominant 202 after the end of twenty overs. CSK won the match here, and credit also goes to Mukesh Choudhary for restricting the opposite team by picking up four wickets.
Gaikwad was going through a tremendously lousy patch this year; this splendid knock of 99 in Match 46 is the first at-his-best performance by him. Today he seemed flawless; the way he played the game remained the epitome of elegance and sense. His coming back on the run is relieving for the CSK team.
Gaikwad was also confidently assisted by Conway, and he also got a spectacular knock of unbeaten 85 in 55 balls. It was a day for CSK openers. Indeed, the wrapping up was not desired; they could have dragged much further. But a 200-up score is always good to go.
The people most overjoyed with his return were cricket fantasy league players. It is a virtual platform where countless cricket-crazy fans worldwide create their team. Given Gaikwad’s previous performance, it doesn’t make much sense to have him on the team, but today’s performance shows why anticipation of actual performance is so brutal before the match. Fantasy cricket buffs would be astonished to find him so capable of knocking down enemies; it renders him incredibly desirable of being picked up.
SRH, however, seemed run-of-the-mill in front of CSK bowling. They ended up in 189, a few biggies and boundaries were hammered, but as things were under CSK control, they managed to take up timely wickets. In this part, credit goes to Mukesh Choudhary, and he took up four wickets.
After the fourth match, the head coach and skipper Jadeja said nothing was going right for them. Of course, it would be an overestimation to say that the problems have been resolved, but you, too, would admit that today CSK has depicted itself as much brighter in all the possible aspects. However, Jadeja was the skipper for the first eight matches; finally, after stepping down, Dhoni, from the ninth match onwards, worked as the captain.
With the pressure of captaincy, Jadeja was not performing well either as a batter or a bowler. So CSK team management has decided to depend upon the all-time great Indian skipper, MS Dhoni. Dhoni would be happy with his team’s collective performance now, but he also knows there’s a long way to go this year – now CSK, after nine matches, has won only three and is positioned at 9th position of the league table.
