And it’s done. MS Dhoni’s CSK have won the IPL title for the 4th time, after getting ousted before the playoffs in the previous season and following it up with a below-average performance in the India leg of this one.
That, however, is how CSK has always been. The “dad’s army” has proven people wrong so many times, that in the future, writing them off before the final results come in would be a little embarrassing for the critics.
Led by MS Dhoni, who seems to have regained his “magic touch”, CSK crushed it in the Dubai leg of the tournament. They qualified for the playoffs pretty early on and though they lost some group stage games after that, the team made up for it with a sensational victory in the semifinal against Delhi Capitals.
As for the final, well, it was more KKR’s inadequacy than CSK’s brilliance in all fairness. Though CSK played well, 192 was not exactly an un-chase-able target. Add to that Venkatesh Iyer’s half-century after being dropped on a duck by MS Dhoni.
Luck did its part, but batsmen couldn’t. They fell like a house of cards after the first dismissal and from 15th over onwards, it was pretty clear that some sort of miracle would be needed for them to win.
This obviously didn’t happen, because the miracle was playing for the other team. This may be Dhoni’s last game for CSK, maybe last as a captain, we are not sure. But if either of those possibilities turns out to be true, this is as good as an end could be. Here are people’s reactions to the same.
CSK won the match by 27 runs, and can go back with not just the trophy but also the orange cap. Ruturaj Gaikwad, with 635 runs, became the youngest player to get the honour.
He surpassed KL Rahul and was going to be surpassed by Faf du Plessis, who missed out on it by a whisker.
One can be certain, though, that this is not playing on the minds of either right now.
The IPL trophy is for CSK to keep, once again, and so is the pride of doing something they were not expected to do, yet again.