IPL 2020: Areas of improvement for all 8 franchises

3. Chennai Super Kings:

Squad- M.S Dhoni(c), KM Asif, Dwayne Bravo, Deepak Chahar, Piyush Chawla, Sam Curran, Faf du Plessis, Rituraj Gaikwad, Josh Hazlewood, Imran Tahir, Ravindra Jadeja, Kedar Jadhav, Narayan Jagadeesan, Monu Kumar, Lungi Ngidi, Ambati Rayudu, R sai Kishore, Mitchell Santner, Karn Sharma, Shardul Thakur, Murali Vijay, Shane Watson

Chennai Super Kings, one of the most successful sides in the IPL, have a real job on their hands this season. Known as “Dad’s Army”, their main-stays have not had game time for a while now. Dhoni didn’t play any international cricket post the WC; du Plessis and Jadhav were out of favour for their national teams, and Shane Watson has retired from international cricket. This might result in the players being rusty in the initial phases of the tournament. They might also be more injury-prone considering most of them have crossed 35 now. 

Mr IPL Suresh Raina’s withdrawal from further participation in the tournament shall be highly detrimental for the CSK team. It’s almost impossible to imagine a CSK XI without him, and he has left a huge void to be filled at number 3. He would have also been handy with his quirky off-breaks in the spinner-friendly wickets of UAE. The value that he adds as a fielder is also unparalleled, and he would have surely improved the scenario in an already ageing squad. 

While CSK have an enviable spin attack, they don’t have a very appealing pace attack. Deepak Chahar was COVID-19 positive a couple of weeks back, and it might take him some time to settle down into the scheme of things. Hazlewood hasn’t proved himself yet in the shortest format. Shardul Thakur leaks runs at the death, which in turn increases reliance on Bravo in the final overs.