Saturday was an exceptional day in the 2022 Indian Premier League. Virat Kohli scored runs. Mumbai Indians won a game. And MS Dhoni was announced as captain for the remainder of Chennai Super Kings’ season. It was almost an unnatural happenstance, like the heatwave currently plaguing the Indian sub-continent.
Of the three, the last bit of information is the most crucial. Royal Challengers Bangalore’s fate is dependent on more than just Kohli’s form at the moment. Mumbai Indians’ season is already done and dusted. For Chennai, well, it isn’t so much about qualification, which is mathematically still possible. It is a matter of playing in a different manner to the first half of this 2022 IPL season.
Let us be honest. Ravindra Jadeja was never meant to lead CSK (or any other cricket team for that matter). It happened because the Super Kings’ team management bungled their retention and auction strategies. The cricketer who should be leading them is currently the RCB captain – pure and simple. If Dhoni had already informed CSK about his decision before the retentions happened, then the person who let Faf du Plessis go, should be sacked on the spot, for it has cost CSK this IPL season.
For his part, Jadeja also knew for a long time that he would be leading CSK in IPL 2022. Following in the footsteps of someone like Dhoni is nearly impossible – just ask Kohli. But the insipid manner in which Jadeja discharged his leadership duties begged the question if he was mentally ready to do the job. Captaincy, especially in a high-profile environment, is a 24×7 job and it simply doesn’t begin with, or end after, the game. You are always the captain – in team meetings, get-togethers, practice sessions, advertisement shoots, so on and so forth.
Was this move inevitable then? The franchise wouldn’t have wanted it to be so, for success is the only parameter that matters in the IPL. But at times, you need to take a breath and step back. Jadeja was suffering as captain and as a player. You remember him tanking the ball all over UAE in IPL 2021 and wondered if that batsman had stayed back. It was the same with his bowling, made worse by the fact that captain Jadeja simply didn’t know when to bring himself on. The roles were getting blurred, and decision making awry.
Perhaps the final straw was his body language whilst fielding. Jadeja dropping catches is as unpredictable as the after-effects of climate change. He was simply not enjoying himself on the field. Couple it with CSK’s results, and you felt something had to give. The management didn’t do it, for they would look like fools after half a season. But with the T20 World Cup coming up, and his spot on the line, Jadeja made the call for himself.
Mid-season captaincy changes in the IPL, then, are akin to mid-season managerial changes in football. When the new leader comes in, there is definitely a bounce in form. And it is factor that multiplies ten-fold when someone like Dhoni takes charge again. In the build-up to the Chennai versus Sunrisers Hyderabad, this is all that mattered. It was almost as if Hyderabad had been cast aside and how CSK would approach this game was a singular point.
It reflected best in Ruturaj Gaikwad’s innings. 138 runs in eight innings was a far cry from the record-breaking run he produced in IPL 2021. When any batsman scored 600-plus runs in a season, you expect him to kick on. Gaikwad certainly was expected to, and he had even reached the fringes of the Indian dressing room. Since then, the step back has been spectacular in a manner and he has to do it all over again now. Sunday, then, was the first step in this direction.
For the first seven deliveries, Gaikwad just loitered about. Then, Marco Jansen pitched it short and quick. The opener was done squirming and he swivelled to pull it over fine leg for six. That was your first pointer of things to come. Gaikwad unleashed a full array of pulls against Sunrisers’ left-arm pacers and it signalled his aggressive intent. More than that, it showed that Chennai Super Kings was ready to reclaim its swagger of old under Dhoni’s renewed leadership.
Gaikwad and Devon Conway haven’t batted much together, but you didn’t get that impression at all. They moved along at 10-plus per over for the majority of Chennai’s innings and a 200-plus total was only a formality. Even so, it was the manner in which those runs were scored. The opening duo exhibited sheer disdain for arguably the best pace attack on display in IPL 2022. It was almost as if the big boys had come out to play and the younger lot was simply brushed off.
Sample what Gaikwad did with Umran Malik’s pace. In his very first over, the pocket dynamite touched 154 clicks. This is a fast bowler who has been tearing up opposition batsmen at every opportunity, and nowadays it is a case of when and not if Sunrisers unleash him. People want to watch him, whether from the stands or through the television. Gaikwad had other plans though – spanked for a six over long-on, and then a straight drive down the ground. Malik was not ready for this counterattack.
Hyderabad’s most impressive pacers Malik and T Natarajan had shared 30 wickets between them before this game. Gaikwad and Conway simply shred them to bits, taking 90 off eight overs. This was not maniacal hitting, but a calculated power assault on Hyderabad’s strength. It was a throwback to when Shane Watson and du Plessis terrorised opposition bowling with their tall partnerships. It was a call back to the chutzpah and swagger of Chennai Super Kings of old.
You could connect with this display of batting, and then bowling, both purposeful, as if the players knew what they were doing finally. Be it Dhoni promoting himself to number three, or Mukesh Choudhary picking four wickets to hold off Nicholas Pooran’s late charge. Hyderabad was never in it, merely a side prop to what was Chennai’s redemption act through and through on Sunday night.
The calculations can begin now. Six points from nine games. Six games remaining. 12 points on offer. Qualification for knockouts is still possible for Chennai, albeit it is a tough road ahead. ‘New captaincy bounce’ is one thing, but this would be a fantastic heist even for Dhoni. Can he do it one more time?
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