CSK vs SRH | Player Ratings - Shane Watson pyrotechnics propels Chennai Super Kings to top of points table
Shane Watson was all fire with the bat tonight and his 96 ensured that Sunrisers Hyderabad’s 176-run target was safely tracked down by the team from far south. The Aussie should also be thankful to Suresh Raina, who first used the powerplay to restore parity after SRH dominated the first four overs.
Shane Watson (9/10): When the chips are down, when everything around you screams for support, the toughest of the blokes rise to the occasion. It was a kind of a day which Watson would love to have more in his life as he decimated Rashid Khan and all other bowlers coming his way to help CSK to a memorable win with his 96-run innings. The audacity and the acceleration was the major reason behind Watson being the MVP in the game.
Faf du Plessis (2/10): Okay, let’s get the odd one out first. Before you want to know how many catches did Faf du Plessis take tonight, let me reveal it for you, NONE. Not for his fault though. However, what could be held against him was the fact that he didn’t try to assert himself against Khaleel Ahmed as the left-arm pacer suddenly looked like world-class. It was in his slot and at least a couple of them, could be dispatched on the on-side as Bhuvneshwar Kumar kept the same fieldset as he did for himself.
Suresh Raina (7/10): It is always frustrating to see any batsman getting off a dream start and then being dismissed in a manner which would make him a joke on Twitter. Suresh Raina’s stay in the middle was pretty much like that as he helped CSK surge past the jittery period in the powerplay, but after scoring a fluent 38-run innings, he played to the wrong line against Rashid Khan to be stumped by an alert Jonny Bairstow.
Ambati Rayudu (5/10): With the pressure of selection off his shoulder, Ambati Rayudu batted without any pressure. While in most cases it would’ve been an attacking outburst, for Rayudu, it meant to be out there and ensuring that the team didn’t face any major collapses at the end and was safely over the line.
Kedar Jadhav (6/10): A Watson blitzkrieg almost closed the door on SRH’s face and Kedar Jadhav just needed to give the finishing touch to the structure. The Maharashtra pocket dynamite did that with elan as Jadhav scored 10 off 11 balls to take the team over the line in the last over when my colleague and die-hard CSK fan Srijith Gopal almost had a heart attack. Thankfully, he is alright now.
MS Dhoni (6/10): During the toss, MS Dhoni talked about the importance of his top-order firing, and they collectively took notice. With Shane Watson’s innings almost seizing the game for CSK, he didn’t need to come out to bat tonight. However, the CSK skipper was confident behind the stumps and his stumping to send David Warner back to the pavilion was a classic MS dismissal.
Dwayne Bravo(2/10): In Chennai, emotions are enjoyed with a sprinkle of pepper from the humidity gods but Bravo was haunted by it. The Caribbean, whom Chennai has adopted as one of their own, was owned by the city’s sapping humidity. That showed in his bowling too as he was struggling with his rhythm. By pitching it up, he made the job of the batsmen easier, but one wouldn’t really fail to understand why most of the fielders were stationed on the leg-side for him.
Ravindra Jadeja (2/10): In T20 cricket, the most important aspect for a spinner to have is a plan B. CSK batsmen badly needed a good surface to get going and if that was going to be the case, a tight bowler was needed. In every day of the week, MS Dhoni is going to pick Ravindra Jadeja for the same role but the left-armer was more interested in picking wickets. Invariably, that resulted in SRH going bonkers against him and the late realisation couldn’t help from giving his bowling figure a torrid look.
Deepak Chahar (6/10): The Chennai pacer’s bowling today was an ode to his intuition and to how wired he is as soon as he's got a ball in his hands. With the ball coming to the bat easily and the evenness of the ground ensuring the ball moving faster than it should’ve normally, Chahar dragged the length back on an experimental basis to beat the outside edge. Pandey tried to be more assertive in the middle-overs but by sticking to the same formula, he dismissed Vijay Shankar in the last over and gave his bowling figure a respectable look.
Imran Tahir (3/10): As Chepauk threw in a batting-friendly wicket, Imran Tahir suddenly became vulnerable as the duo of Manish Pandey and David Warner found it easy to dispatch him over the stands. One of the major problems he had to endure was the lack of proper gripping and with dew keeping the ball wet, he was too much dependent on keeping stock deliveries only for Pandey. Warner, meanwhile, had some fun as Tahir conceded 38 runs - his highest economy rate in the tournament so far.
Harbhajan Singh (5/10): The Punjab off-spinner’s greatest strength has been his ability to outfox the batsmen with his gullies and due to his coiling action, it is hard to get a grip of that at times. Bowling in the powerplay, Harbhajan ensured that he was within the wickets, but as the ball became predictable, the stock deliveries were taken for cleaners. He could’ve just gone back to the simple theory of restricting the run flow and tonight demanded that approach badly.
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