First they lost to the Rajasthan Royals by eight wickets. Then, they were beaten by the Kolkata Knight Riders by seven wickets, before the Sunrisers Hyderabad handed out a 22-run defeat to the Chennai Super Kings on Saturday night.
It has come as a huge surprise to see CSK losing those three matches. That is because they are the best team in the competition who have been the table toppers. When playing this many matches in the league stage, a few games can go awry.
The good news is that CSK haven’t lost the focus to do well in the rest of their remaining six encounters. With non-stop cricket being played in the previous seven days, CSK will be looking to finish this match on a high when they take on the in-form Royal Challengers Bangalore at the Chepauk, in Chennai, on Monday.
So what went wrong in the Hyderabad match? David Warner, the Sunrisers’ captain, played a gem of knock for his team making him one of the leading scorers in the IPL. He batted with supreme authority to enable his team to make 192 for seven.
Thereafter, the CSK batsmen did get a rousing start to their chase, but lost important wickets in the bargain. While chasing a daunting total, CSK needed one of the top four batsmen to stay till the end in order to secure a much needed win.
All of them got off to a good start, but none of them could translate the impetus into a match winning knock.. A lot of credit must be given to the Sunrisers’ bowlers as well for restricting a power-packed CSK batting line-up.
Therefore, it will be important for MS Dhoni’s team to be in top gear when they face RCB’s Mitchell Starc and company on Monday evening. It’s going to be an interesting battle for sure because these two teams are looking good to play this year’s IPL play-offs.
