Great to see Dhoni re-inventing himself to play one of the most aggressive knocks against Punjab Kings XI and keeping his cool in the death overs as captain. Dhoni was not at his element all through the first phase of the tournament with most of the experiments going against him and CSK lost 3 games in a row. Finally Dhoni & CSK has come out strongly to perform like champs and looks like they can not go wrong from here but for the very ordinary fielding performance.
I still feel there is some confusion in the batting line up even though they have sort of sorted out things and seems to have hit the best combination. My pri match batting order will be like Haydos,Vijay,Raina,Badri,Dhoni,Morkel,Oram and may be based on the match situation badri can be pushed back in the order but i feel they have to stick to this line up. If CSK is pushed to think of an extra bowler, i would prefer dropping Oram and play Ntini rather than disturb Haydos and Vijay pair. In my view Oram has not been able to adapt to the T20 format yet, i think he has bowled very few overs and has got few opportunity to score big with the bat. I have a feeling Ntini might give his best, if given a chance now and may also get ready for the super semi-finals.
Morkel and Thyagi have been good in the last couple of matches with some great seam bowling and most importantly not giving away any extra runs in the initial overs. Murali,Jataki and Balaji have come good in the last 3 matches with some tight spells in the middle overs and Raina has been proving to be the trusted bowler in the death overs. Morkel and Balaji are little bit unpredictable in the end overs, invariably both of them provide a big (12-18 runs) over in the end, need to improve on this and restrict to a 10 run over in the end, Ntini in place of Oram might strike the required balance.
Its all open and dhoni has been pleading in the pre-match and post-match comments that CSK need to field better and hold on to all the chances that come their way. Is this because we don't have a fielding coach :-) may not be, see how many coach's KKR got and also look at their performance, i feel its all in the mind and if one or two come up with some special effort (like the one Raina took in the last game ) all others will follow suit. Today there is a lot of doubt if they will hold on to the chance so they let them go. Hope the confidence is back soon and does not cost them any more.
CSK has a good 4 day break and i am sure will help the old boys of the team (Haydos & Murali) to cool of their heels. Having said that we have another 4 matches and if we win the next 2 matches we are sure of making it to the semi-finals. Need to give some rest for Haydos,Murali,Morkel (has been playing non stop for the past 8 months) & Balaji. Baily has not been tried out till now and has been in the bench for too long and the only match he played he did not bat or bowl so i would expect dhoni to try his bench strength so that they will be useful for 2010 :-). Its the same with Ashwin, he got a game to play but did not bowl or bat so if it will help if they have to replace someone due to injury or some unexpected events.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Yes Vasu... the team is well settled and gelled now. Good to see Dhoni striking so well.. hope he continues in the same vein.
You are right in pointing out that we need Ntini badly.. Oram is not getting much opportunity to bat or bowl.. and even if he does. he is not making use of it. Atleast having Ntini in the side.. we can have a tear away fast bowler who can destroy the opponents in a spell.. rather than the one dimensional pace attack of seam bowlers....
With the coming four matches being relatively easy, Chennai has a good chance of being the first team in the semis.. hope they get everything right for the semis and finals too :)
A clinical performance by the CSK for the last couple of weeks. Good job done by the boys except for the fielding. Congrats for their performance. They need to keep this winning momentum going.
One thing which puzzles me is Dhoni uses Thyagi only for the initial couple of overs. The last two matches his economy was below six after bowling two overs. But after that he doesn't get to bowl for the rest of the match. If Dhoni feels Thyagi is inexperienced to bowl the death overs, he can be given one extra over front up. It may definitely prove to be a wicket taking one due to the pressure he builds up.
Regarding Oram, Nitini could certainly be a right replacement. This is the best time for some final adjustments in the line up.
Post a Comment