IPL 2020 | MS Dhoni likes to have options with bowlers at the death, insists Joy Bhattacharjya

Chennai, in a much contrasting performance to their current form, played an almost perfect match against Hyderabad and secured the game by 20 runs. Shane Watson was the top scorer for CSK, scoring 42 runs off 38 deliveries. Interestingly, Sam Curran, who scored 31 off 21 balls, was promoted up the order to open the innings, in a move that worked in favour of the Chennai based franchise. On the bowling front, Ravindra Jadeja was excellent with the ball, taking the crucial wicket of Jonny Bairstow and turning the game on its head, ending with figures of 1/21. Dwayne Bravo and Shardul Thakur bowled the last 2 overs of the match excellently, giving away just 6 runs in 2 overs. 

Joy Bhattacharjya insisted that MS Dhoni likes to be in a situation in which he has options to move around, which was the case in the match against SRH, where Dhoni had 5 bowlers to choose from to bowl the last 2 overs. He pointed out that Dhoni operates his bowlers according to the dimensions of the ground and even though, Karn Sharma gave away 19 runs in his last over despite bowling to a favourable dimension of the ground, Dhoni knew that someone will stand up to perform when push comes to shove. 

“The fact that he went into the last 2 overs with 5 choices of bowlers still alive is exactly what way the position Dhoni likes to be. Lots of options, lots of things to do, you know he knows it - there’s a leg-spinner this boundary is short, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. It didn’t work with Karn Sharma. I mean he still got hit though he was bowling on the right side of the fielders at work,” Joy said on Cricbuzz Live. 

“But that’s what Dhoni can do. He has options, he knows that there’s enough runs for me to play with even if it goes there, somebody’s going to push it back and those last 2 overs were spectacular.”