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When CSK Made Historic Bid For MS Dhoni By Acquiring Him For Whopping 1.5$ Million 

image-lsu13qv0MS Dhoni's CSK journey began in 2008 [X.com]

In the history of the Indian Premier League (IPL), there has been no bid as grand and pathbreaking as the one Chennai Super Kings (CSK) made to acquire the services of their legendary skipper and wicketkeeper-batter Mahendra Singh ahead of the league's inaugural edition back in 2008. 

CSK purchased the then India captain in the marquee players' list at the bidding war for a sum of 1.5$ million in perhaps the most intelligent piece of investment ever made by a franchise. 


Despite Ms Dhoni being from Jharkhand and having no original affiliation with Chennai, CSK took a leap of faith on the man, who was carrying a new wave in Indian cricket with his youthful exuberance and popular brand of cricket. 

That moment arrived today (February 20), 16 years back, and completely transformed not just CSK's fortunes to establish them as one of the most successful T20 teams in the globe but also helped the IPL scale humoungous heights in terms of popularity and reach. 

Dhoni Completes 16 Successful Years With CSK 

Once Dhoni had been roped in, it was an absolute no-brainer for the CSK ownership and management group to appoint him their captain as Chennai's adopted son soon turned the franchise into an unparalleled brand with tremendous fan-following and fashioned their playing culture with his great vision and champion mentality. 



It took CSK only two seasons before they won their first IPL trophy under Dhoni's captaincy in 2010, before they clinched the prestigious title again in the 2011 edition of the annual T20 carnival. 

Dhoni's brigade has since won the coveted crown in the 2018, 2021 and 2023 editions of the IPL as well as winning the 2012 and 2014 editions of the now-disbanded Champions League T20. 

Individually too, the legend has been an enormous success as a wicketkeeper-batter and one of the finest middle-order batters in the history of the IPL. Dhoni has played a record 226 matches as IPL captain with 12 playoff appearances over 15 campaigns, including 10 finals. 

He has scored second most runs (4,660) as captain and struck most sixes (218) in IPL history apart from smashing the second-most number of fours (316) and hitting second-most (22) fifty-plus scores.