Press Trust of India
Chennai, April 9: If one takes away Mahendra Singh Dhoni from the Chennai Super Kings (CSK), the amount paid for the rest of the 10 players who played against Delhi Daredevlis (DD) here Thursday would not total Rs 16 crore – the amount the Delhi franchise has spent for Yuvraj Singh. And in return, the all-rounder’s contribution was a catch and nine runs. He was again found wanting against the short ball as Dwane Bravo beat him for pace and Yuvraj’s attempted hook resulted in a simple catch to Ishwar Pandey.
The Devils turned devils for themselves only with some erroneous decisions. On a bouncy track, they left their quickest bowler Mohammed Shami out of the playing XI. In retrospect had Shami played, DD could have easily restricted the Kings to total less than what the hosts scored –150 for the loss of seven wickets. A couple of runs less would have meant victory for DD as they finished on 149 for nine with Albie Morkel only managing a boundary when a six was needed off the last ball.
And then the strange shuffling of batting order also left a lot of unanswered questions. Morkel (73 n o, 55b, 8×4, 1×6) was sent at No. 3 as a pinch hitter. He did try his best but did not get support from the other end.
Also skipper JP Duminy’s decision to send in Yuvraj at No. 6 was strange considering the fact that the team’s best batsman should get to face the maximum number of deliveries. When Yuvraj walked in he only had 41 balls remaining to do his Houdini act. He failed and with it Delhi’s chances disappeared.
Earlier CSK were caught in a spin web and could only manage a modest total. Put into bat, opener Dwayne Smith (34) and middle-order batsman Faf du Plessis (32) provided a good platform for Chennai but Delhi’s spin trio of Amit Mishra (1/21), Imran Tahir (1/27) and Duminy (1/15) bowled beautifully to restrict Chennai to a modest score. It was Dhoni’s two sixes in the last over that took the Kings past the 150-run mark. Australian pacer Nathan Coulter-Nile (3/30) however was the highest wicket-taker for Delhi.
Brief scores: CSK 150 for 7 (Dwayne Smith 34, MS Dhoni 30 n o, Nathan Coulter-Nile 3/30) bt DD 149 for 9 (Albie Morkel 73 n o, Ashish Nehra 3/25) by one run.
