Maestro captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni spurred his side to immediate impact in the Chennai Super Kings’ first game under him in IPL 2022.
The Chennai batting fired after an extended dry run. Ruturaj Gaikwad finally showed glimpses of returning to form, scoring a fantastic 99. Devon Conway played the perfect supporting role as CSK reached a massive total of 202/2 in their 20 overs before their bowlers did well to pull things back for their side, eventually wrapping up a comfortable victory by 13 runs. Mukesh Choudhary did a brilliant job with the ball, picking up four wickets.
Hyderabad captain Kane Williamson won his eighth toss in a row and put the opposition into bat. Ruturaj Gaikwad, who did not seem to be in the best of form in this edition of the IPL, broke out of his poor run, smashing the bowlers to all parts of the ground. The highlight of the innings was how Gaikwad played the express pacer Umran Malik, who was dominated by the opener.
Conway played the supporting role to perfection, standing ground at the other end as the scoreboard ticked along courtesy of Gaikwad. Ruturaj he kept the Chennai run-rate consistently above 10 while the Chennai scorecard crossed three figures.
Ruturaj raced to 77 before Conway unleashed the barrage of shots, taking Marco Jansen for 20 runs in the fifteenth over. The Kiwi international continued, and the duo’s mammoth partnership eventually ended in heartbreaking fashion, with Gaikwad falling for 99. Conway continued to attack as he and former skipper Ravindra Jadeja finished off the innings, with 202 on the board.
The Sunrisers did start off well, with Abhishek Sharma and Kane Williamson getting off to good starts. However, the start could not be capitalised on because both Abhishek and the in-form Rahul Tripathi were dismissed off successive balls, putting Hyderabad in a problematic position.
Aiden Markram set out to do the job for the Sunrisers, and for a brief while, it did look like that would happen. However, there was not much the South African could do about it, as he was dismissed by Mitchell Santner after hitting him for a couple of sixes, giving the New Zealander the last laugh.
Nicholas Pooran then joined the skipper in the middle. Williamson was finding the gaps in the field and was able to score at a quick rate. He was undoubtedly holding the Hyderabad innings together, and therefore it was not surprising that the entire innings fell apart after his dismissal.
With a tough ask, there wasn’t much that Shashank Singh could do as he and Washington Sundar both fell in the space of a few deliveries. Despite Pooran’s best efforts, he was not able to bring the equation down, leaving the Sunrisers with 38 runs to get off the final over.
Pooran, nevertheless, scored 24 runs off Choudhary’s final over, making a mess out of his bowling figures, but more importantly brought the net run-rate deficit down with some good hitting, even reaching his half century on the way. Chennai’s win was their third of the tournament and their first under MS Dhoni in this season of the IPL.
Brief scores
Chennai Super Kings 202 for 2 (Gaikwad 99, Conway 85*, Natarajan 2-42) beat Sunrisers Hyderabad 189 for 6 (Pooran 64*, Williamson 47, Abishek 39) by 13 runs
