IPL 2020: MS Dhoni clarifies the reason why he came to bat at No. 7

IPL 2020 just in its fourth day has created a massive upset as Rajasthan Royals defeated favourites Chennai Super Kings by 16 runs.

Royals put up a massive score of 216 runs batting first. Sanju Samson made an incredible 74 of just 32 balls which included 9 sixes! Steve Smith led by example as he scored 69 of just 47 balls. Jofra Archer added cherry on the cake by scoring 27 of just 8 balls.

While chasing, CSK came fairly close but was restricted to 200 runs. Faf Du Plessis picked off from where he left last time as he scored 72 runs of 37. MS Dhoni played a cameo of 29 runs of just 17 balls which included three consecutive sixes in the last over.

However, the fact that MS Dhoni came to bat at No. 7 has been an issue of controversy across the cricketing community. CSK didn’t have the services of Ambati Rayadu who was the highest run-scorer in their last game. Despite that, Dhoni sent Sam Curran, Kedar Jadhav, and debutant Ruturaj Gaikwad ahead of him is baffling.

Gambhir slams the decision!

Former KKR captain and Indian opener Gautam Gambhir certainly wasn’t happy with Dhoni’s batting number. He didn’t measure any words to give his opinion.

“I was a bit surprised, to be honest,” Gambhir said. 

“MS Dhoni batting at No. 7? And sending Gaikwad before him, Sam Curran before him. Makes no sense to me. In fact, you should be leading from the front. And this is not what you call leading from the front. Batting at No. 7 when you’re chasing what… 213 [217]? The game was over. Faf was probably the lone warrior.”

“Yes, you can talk about MS Dhoni last over [when he hit three sixes], but it was of no use, to be honest. It was just all personal runs.”

Dhoni cleared the air on the issue!

Dhoni weighed in on the issue. He believes the lacklustre camp due to the pandemic was the reason why he came to bat lower down the order.

“I haven’t batted for a long time. 14-day quarantine doesn’t help.”

CSK coach Stephen Fleming defended his team’s reason for sending the captain at number 7 as well.

“MS is a specialist at the end of the innings, always has been,” Fleming said. “Curran was there to try and hit us and keep us in the game at that point when we were falling behind. He’s got good hitting power as we saw. Ruturaj… it was his first game and we wanted to get him into the game, into the order. We wanted to be aggressive, we’ve got a long batting order and we’re just trying to use our resources smartly.”

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