Two teams that have never laid their hands on the Indian Premier League (IPL) trophy have breached five-time champion Chennai Super Kings’ fortress in less than 10 days.
After Royal Challengers Bengaluru handed CSK its biggest defeat at home last Friday, Delhi Capitals ended its 15-year winless draught at the M.A. Chidambaram Stadium against the Super Kings with a 25-run win on Saturday.
There couldn’t be a more fitting corrosion of CSK’s storied legacy at home as Delhi’s spinners overshadowed their counterparts to scupper CSK’s 184-run chase after the host’s batters failed to come to grips with the conditions in the first day-night match at the venue.
Super Kings lost their top three inside the first six overs, continuing their abysmal run in the PowerPlay, and skipper Ruturaj Gaikwad’s fatal pull to deep backward square-leg off Mitchell Starc was a microcosm of the team’s larger malaise against the short ball.
Left to pick the pieces
MS Dhoni and Vijay Shankar’s 84-run partnership for the sixth wicket was peppered with the odd boundary, but the crowd was losing its voice with every passing ball.
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The drone that accompanied Dhoni’s four behind point off Mukesh Kumar in the final over was instructive of the fans’ disappointment.
To be fair, Dhoni and Shankar were left to pick up the pieces as early as the 11th over, with five wickets down and 12 runs needed per over on a pitch that was getting slower.
Chennai Super Kings’ MS Dhoni and Vijay Shankar run between wickets.
| Photo Credit:
PTI Photo/R Senthilkumar
Chennai Super Kings’ MS Dhoni and Vijay Shankar run between wickets.
| Photo Credit:
PTI Photo/R Senthilkumar
The middle-order was wrecked by the spin duo of Vipraj Nigam and Kuldeep Yadav as CSK became a victim of its own gameplan on a pitch that, by CSK head coach Stephen Fleming’s own admission, the home team has failed to wrap its head around.
Getting the left-right combinations right
After electing to bat, Delhi Capitals made the most of its left-right pairs to keep CSK’s bowlers at bay. After losing Jake-Fraser McGurk to a toe-ended hoick in the first over, KL Rahul and Abishek Porel rushed to 51 runs in the PowerPlay, largely thanks to a 19-run second over from Mukesh Choudhary.
Porel laid into the left-arm seamer, pulling and ramping his short deliveries for a six and two fours in the span of three balls. Soon, Rahul found his footing with a flicked six over fine-leg in the fifth over, as Khaleel Ahmed bowled a rare length delivery on leg-stump. CSK’s ploy to employ R. Ashwin in the PowerPlay didn’t reap dividends for the third time in a row, with Porel finding the boundary behind point off the first delivery of the sixth over as Capitals closed out the initial phase without further damage.
Ravindra Jadeja struck in the first over after the end of the fielding restrictions, with Porel’s luck with cheeky shots running out when he guided the ball straight to short-third. But DC skipper Axar Patel’s promotion to No. 4 meant the left-right combination continued. Axar was off the blocks with a six over long-on off Jadeja, and crisply drove Ashwin through extra-cover in the next over, skipping down the track to get to the pitch of the ball on both occasions on a day the ball turned more than usual.
Rahul preferred to employ the sweep, and deposited Noor Ahmad over deep midwicket. But when Axar attempted to reprise the shot a couple of deliveries later, Noor dropped it a little shorter and disturbed the woodwork.
Sameer Rizvi, in the team for an injured Faf du Plessis, joined hands with Rahul for a brisk 50-run stand for the fifth wicket. He sent Noor’s wide-outside-off-stump delivery into the CSK dugout, and that was fittingly the last ball bowled by a CSK spinner on the day as the trio of Ashwin, Jadeja and Noor sent down just eight overs between them.
Matheesha Pathirana’s nose-and-toes lengths, and his pace variations were the only silver lining of CSK’s third defeat on the bounce. The Sri Lankan slinger’s four overs just went for 31 runs, and his 12 balls at the death only produced 13 as Delhi could only eke out 45 runs in the last five overs.
Mukesh’s horror evening continued in the penultimate over, where he woefully missed his lengths to concede 15 runs, and a dropped catch off his own bowling only added to the pain. A Dhoni catch and run-out in the final over added some relief, but it was only temporary.
