IPL 2020: I used to go to Chepauk to watch MS Dhoni bat, reveals Varun Chakravarthy

IPL 2020: MS Dhoni is a great finisher but he needs to look at other players- Brian Lara

Legendary former West Indies skipper Brian Lara is of the opinion that MS Dhoni should consider other options for the role of a finisher as the latter has been struggling of late. Chennai Super Kings’ latest defeat came against Kolkata Knight Riders on Wednesday. Dhoni has failed to provide the finishing touches and last night was no different. The 39-year-old scored 11 off 12 balls before getting out to Varun Chakravarthy. Chasing 168 for victory, the three-time champions ended up losing the game by 10 runs. “It’s a bit puzzling (Dhoni inability to finish). You feel that he has created that position where he can be flexible with himself but I think he needs to maybe look at some other players,” Lara was quoted as saying on Star Sports. According to Lara, Dwayne Bravo should be promoted up the order. The all-rounder scalped three wickets against KKR but didn’t get to bat. The Chennai outfit was cruising after the first 10 overs. The side had scored 90 runs at the loss of one wicket with Shane Watson in good touch. They needed 78 runs off 60 balls with nine wickets intact. However, things took a sudden turn as KKR got back into the game in the later stages.

IPL 2020 | KKR vs CSK: 3 Reasons Why Karthik's Kolkata outfox MS Dhoni and Chennai

The Kolkata Knight Riders staged an incredible comeback in the final 10 overs of the game to defeat Chennai Super Kings in the 21st match of the Indian Premier League 2020 at Abu Dhabi on Wednesday 7 November. Down and out after scoring a below-par 167 in the first innings, Kolkata dug the hole for themselves in the first half of the second innings, with CSK cruising at 90/1 at the 10-over mark. Or so it seemed that time with Dinesh Karthik no deciding to bowl his best bowler Sunil Narine for a single over of the game. What unfurled next was a thing of beauty. KKR bowlers led by Narine choked the life out of Chennai batsmen, letting them score just 67 runs for the loss of 4 wickets to write an incredible story in the IPL. On that note here are the three reasons why the Kolkata Knight Riders, down and out by a country mile, pulled off an incredible heist against Chennai Super Kings. Rahul Tripathi Sunil Narine was dropped. Not from the side, but from the batting line-up after a long long time. Since the discovery of his pinch-hitting prowess, Sunil Narine has been Kolkata’s top-order batsmen for quite some time now. After a poor patch of form, Narine was finally dropped down the order for the CSK match and that spot was given to Rahul Tripathi, a natural opener who batted at 8 due to the lack of space in the pecking order. To say that he made the best of the opportunity would be a massive disrespect. In the team’s total of 167, Tripathi alone made 81 off 51 balls. He played a defiant innings laced with 3 sixes and 8 boundaries while his partners kept departing throughout the time he was in the crease. Tripathi’s success at the top of the order means that Narine, who struggled against the pacers throughout this tournament can now be played as a floater, sent in to take on the spinners and go gung-ho from the first ball. This on paper should not only give KKR better balance and more varied options in an already dynamic batting order. Kolkata think tank The victory over Chennai today was engulfed in old school romanticism. This was a victory of a captain that had faith in his plans. Plan to come into the game with something concrete and then be flexible enough to chuck the whole thing into the ground and reshape it with immaculate reading of the game. Dinesh Karthik came into the game facing tremendous backlash from the Delhi Capitals game. Several calls starting from Narine opening Eoin Morgan coming in at 6 and Rahul Tripathi batting at 8 did not sit well with the fans. And then he did this. In the day and age of statistical analysis, he committed several crimes. Defending a paltry target of 168, he did not bowl his top bowler (Narine) in the first 10 overs. He bowled out his best fast bowler at the halfway mark of the game. Just when tempers started flaring once again, came the turnaround. Saving Narine for the second half of the innings became a masterclass. Combined with Varun Chakravarthy, Kamlesh Nagarkoti and Andre Russell Knight Riders choked the life of the opposition. From 90/1 in 10 overs, CSK imploded to lose the game by 10 runs. The victory was an ode to the cricketing brains that have been shaped over years and years of victories, failures and learning, rather than stats, analytics that have taken the game by storm over the last few years. The game was engulfed in old school romanticism. Chennai Super Kings batting order If your lower middle order batsman defends the first ball when 39 runs are required of the last 21 balls, you can safely assume that there is a problem in approach. And there was. For sure, Kolkata need to be credited for their exceptional performance, but there makes no sense that a team cruising at almost 10 runs an over at the midway mark simple surrenders. Coming into bat in the 17th over, Kedar Jadhav played an inexplicable innings of 7 runs off 12 balls that dug CSK’s grave. And what a turn of events has it been for CSK in a space of three days. The other night their openers shared a record 181-stand for the franchise and last night against a struggling KKR, they put up their hands in the air and said, I surrender. The Kolkata Knight Riders would be super, super proud of their victory against CSK. The positives from the game outweigh the shambolic performance by a country mile and Kolkata as a team would like to gain momentum from that. Not only did Karthik got his thinking hat back, they now have a proven opener and a floater than can be as effective in the middle order as he was in the opening overs of the game. KKR play their next game against Kings XI Punjab on 10 October at the Sheikh Zayed stadium and would like to keep their momentum on to stay at the top of the IPL table.

IPL 2020 |KKR vs CSK: Hits and Flops as Jadhav-Dhoni debacle sink the Super Kings

It was one horrendous of an example shown by the Chennai Super Kings as to how to not pace your chase in a match. Batting at 90/1 in the 10th over to not reaching even 160 after the end of the 20 with just five wickets lost, there was something inherently lost in the team. Having said that, it wasn’t on their own, that Chennai managed to achieve this feat. There was obviously the master brain of Dinesh Karthik that executed a well laid out plan, which thankfully worked for the team. A combination of planning and execution from the opposition and lack of it from the Chennai side resulted in what could probably be called the worst run chase of the season so far. There were many heroes in the game that included the likes of Rahul Tripathi with the bat for KKR and Varun Chakravarthy and Sunil Narine the spin duo with the ball. For Chennai, there could have been heroes like Sam Curran with the ball and Shane Watson with the beat, but unfortunately, the hard work that they pulled in was outdone by the sheer unprofessional and stupid stroke play from two of their veteran batsmen in MS Dhoni and Kedar Jadhav All this forms the part of today’s Hits and Flops segment. Hits #1Rahul Tripathi Rahul Tripathi picked up from where he had left in the last innings against the Delhi Capitals in Sharjah. But in Abu Dhabi, the guy made sure that the stays long enough on the crease to propel the team to get to a total that is respectable. The Maharashtra batsman looked in complete control of the innings as he smashed 81 off 51 balls in an innings that included eight fours and three sixes. At a time when all the wickets were falling for KKR, Tripathi held on to one fort maki8ng sure that the team runs along. It was his runs in an otherwise failed batting line-up that gave Kolkata a chance to fight. #2 Varun Chakravarthy The fact that an uncapped player is playing ahead of a young energetic Chinaman bowler who has represented India in all three formats of the game, is in itself a testament to the talent that Chakravarthy possesses with the ball in hand. Called into bowl in the 17th over with MS Dhoni at the strike and having gone for four in the very first ball that he bowled to Dhoni, Varun had the audacity to toss it up and then cleaned up the former India captain with an off-spinner. It was one of the major if not ‘the’ turning point in the game. Varun gave just five runs in that moving over and finished the match with figures of 1/28 in four overs. #3 The duo of Sunil Narine and Dinesh Karthik Varun Chakravarthy was not the only bowler that executed Dinesh Karthik’s plans to the Tee. It was the veteran Sunil Narine that jammed with the captain’s strategy to get the all-important wicket of the Australian Shane Watson that started shifting the game in favour of the KKR. Called into the attack, late in the innings, the plan made by Dinesh Karthik worked as the West Indian not only halted the flow of runs of both Watson and Dhoni after the Ambati Rayudu wicket but also got Watson out, a record fourth time in the IPL. As Karthik said in the post-match presentation, Nari8ne is still a ‘match-winner’ for the KKR outfit and credit must be given to Karthik for not only acknowledging it but also making sure that he is utilized well. Flops #1 Kedar Jadhav If there was ever a test for knowing whether a person could win you a game or not, it should be called the Kedar Jadhav Test i the ho9mnour of the legend, who after coming in the 17th over, played 12 balls to score just seven runs from it, when the team needed 13 runs an over. A team can’t surely win from that position and Chennai didn’t. Jadhav looked like almost case in the middle and showed it with the very first ball that he played, a front foot defense to an off-spinner in the 17th over! Do you get it? I don’t either. #MS Dhoni The person who could be and should be blamed more than Kedar Jadhav is the captain MS Dhoni. Firstly for keeping Jadhav in the team and secondly for getting out in a crucial situation to bring him to bat in that situation, Dhoni must be reprimanded by all the CSK fans. Apart from that, the 39-year-old also made a mistake that we don’t really associate with him. After having hit a four off the previous delivery, with 39 runs needed from 22 balls, a Dhoni of the years gone by would tap a single in a corner and let Sam Curran attack from the next ball. But today he failed himself going for a big slog just after hitting the four. In a game where he could have had the result in his favour if he faced the last legal delivery, Dhoni ju7st threw it, very unlikely of him though. While it is a hard pill to swallow for the Yellow Brigade, but they got to not only swallow it but come out of this mode of losing matches from winning positions as they face Virat Kohli's RCB in the next game on 10th October. For KKIR, it would again be an opportunity to reach top of the table when they face Kings XI on the 10th as well, in the first game of the doubleheader.

IPL 2020 | KKR vs CSK: Rahul Tripathi, Dinesh Karthik and Kolkata bowlers propel Kolkata to third spot

Brief Scores: Kolkata Knight Riders 167 all out in 20 overs (Rahul Tripathi 81, Sunil Narine 17; DJ Bravo 3/37) beat Chennai Super Kings 157/5 in 20 overs (Shane Watson 50, Ambati Rayudu 30; Varun Chakravarty 1/28) by 10 runs. Kolkata Knight Riders mounted a sublime bowling effort to refuse Chennai Super Kings a facile 168-run target to nab their third win of the campaign in the 21st match of the Indian Premier League 2020 at Sheikh Zayed Stadium, Abu Dhabi. Rahul Tripathi accepted the opportunity to open the innings with both hands, smacking a fabulous 81 to mitigate KKR's top-order conundrum once and for all. Losing wickets at vital junctures was the primary reason why CSK concluded on the wrong side of the result despite being in the hunt by and large. KKR displaced Royal Challengers Bangalore from the third position and occupied it courtesy enhanced NRR following tonight's slug-fest at Abu Dhabi. Even-stevens at the end of the PowerPlay Given openers Shane Watson and Faf du Plessis were on seventh heaven following their colossal 181-run stand against Kings XI Punjab, many jumped the gun on KKR's ability to defend. But Shivam Mavi was quick to reiterate that the men in purple won't go down without a fight. He dangled the carrot wide of off-stump as du Plessis feathered behind in an approach to carve it through backward point. Another chance tumbled in KKR's basket after Watson and Ambati Rayudu piloted CSK to 54/1 at the point of the first strategic timeout, but Rahul Tripathi erred in judging a flat short-arm hoick from the former. Wickets topple as CSK feel the heat Kamlesh Nagarkoti's 13th over evoked a mixed bag of emotions for KKR. While Rayudu miscuing a pull to long-on brought a sense of jubilation, Watson notching his fifty in the final ball of Nagarkoti's over suggested CSK still had the wood on the chase. Though Narine's grubber trapped the half-centurion plumb to lend a bit of drama, as even a tactical review signalled umpire's call. The equation now asking for 64 runs off the final six, Sam Curran flexed his muscles to garner ten off Narine. But there was yet another befuddling twist in the tale as mystery-spinner Varun Chakravarthy kept his cool to breach through MS Dhoni's agricultural swipe. The gulf kept stretching, and Curran's loft discovering Eoin Morgan at mid-on did little to relieve the nerves in CSK's camp. A desperate flash of the blade each from Kedar Jadhav and Ravindra Jadeja midget the requirement to 26 off the final over, but Andre Russell slinging three consecutive yorkers ensured a CSK victory was a long shot from thereon. Tripathi nips the opening debate in the bud Better sense finally prevailed for KKR as Rahul Tripathi walked out alongside Shubman Gill instead of customary choice Sunil Narine, who was proving to be nothing more than a dead duck. And he looked the opener manor born, exhibiting a water-tight technique besides taking full toll of easy pickings. The duo tapped to pinch quite a few singles, albeit also committed the cardinal sin of testing Ravindra Jadeja's arm in a couple of near-death shaves. Though Gill strayed from his natural game and fell prey to an across-the-line heave, Tripathi was in no mood to squander the golden opportunity. He sliced a half-volley from Deepak Chahar over mid-off before just managing to evade Sam Curran's leap at long-on with his murderous slog-sweep. Jadeja special headlines CSK rebound Nitish Rana's adventure of smoking Karn Sharma over cow corner - the longest part of the ground - ended up in Jadeja's bucket hands. KKR's think tank chanced their arm by slotting in Narine as a pinch-hitter at number four. The manoeuvre seemed to do the trick, with the left-handed dasher badgering the leggie for a six and a four before Jadeja filed a reminder of his athletic prowess to wind-up his cameo. He zinged from the blocks at mid-wicket and dived parallel to the ground to his right to latch onto an absolute screamer, but as his body was about to skid into the boundary triangles, his excellent presence of mind saw him parrying the ball to Faf du Plessis, approaching in from long-on. Curran then extracted some real fizz from the track to depart Eoin Morgan nicking behind, leaving KKR searching for a move-on at 114/4. Although Tripathi's steady accumulation of runs prevented a complete blockage of momentum. Shardul Thakur resurged for a second burst to eke out dangerman Andre Russell, yet an ebullient Tripathi perishing to a soft dismissal must have been of greater value from CSK's perspective. In spite of Pat Cummins' quickfire 17, KKR could only squeeze 39 between overs 16-20, the final kick doing little justice to Tripathi's lone-ranging endeavour. What's next in store? Kolkata Knight Riders will cherish a two-day breathing space before they cross swords versus a deflated Kings XI Punjab on Saturday, October 10. Later in the evening, it'll be a dance of fire and ice as Royal Challengers Bangalore tackle the scuppering Dad's Army that is Chennai Super Kings.