In front of an enthusiastic Chepauk crowd on Friday night, the Chennai Super Kings made a winning start to their IPL title defence under a new captain. RCB lost in Chennai for the eighth time in a straight as four CSK debutants, including Mustafizur Rahman, dismissed four of Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s top five in ten balls.
Rachin Ravindra, who was playing in his first IPL encounter, also helped to the triumph with 37 off 15 balls at a strike rate of 246.66 on a wicket that slowed down later in the evening. After hitting a four off the first ball of his debut as CSK captain, Yash Dayal, an impact player for the Royals, terminated Ruturaj Gaikwad’s innings on the fifteenth ball.
As he recovered from his injury, Shivam Dube took Mustafizur’s spot as CSK’s impact player and struggled to 15 off 16 balls. However, he quickly picked up the pace to help CSK win with an undefeated 34 off 28 balls, while Ravindra Jadeja added an undefeated 25 off 17. Though MS Dhoni may have anticipated for this when he gave Gaikwad the keys to the CSK kingdom, he was not able to participate in the chase.
If CSK’s death-overs specialist Matheesha Pathirana had been healthy, Mustafizur might not have even been on the pitch. His final results were 4-0-29-4.Due to a counterattacking 95-run partnership for the sixth wicket off just 50 balls, which came to an end off the final ball of the innings thanks to a Dhoni direct hit, RCB concluded at 173 for 6.