Each year that MS Dhoni decides to extend his IPL career, the speculation around his batting position grows. Over the past few years, as his reflexes have slowed, he has gradually dropped down the batting order,
allowing more and more lower-order players to take the finishing responsibilities ahead of him.
In fact, with the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) signing Sanju Samson this year as a clear long-time heir for the veteran, some believe that Dhoni could soon transition into a mentor-like role in the team, where he hardly starts any games unless he has to. However, former CSK star Ravichandran Ashwin believes the contrary.
After watching a recent viral video of Dhoni’s return to practice, Ashwin even wondered if Dhoni could come out to bat in the powerplay at number three.
“Dhoni looks set to play as he has already started practising. He’s looking fit. Some said he may not play in the 11, or this might be his last season. But it looks like he got motivated seeing Imran Tahir. Looking at him, it doesn’t look like he’ll bat at No.9. He looks like he’ll come out to bat at No. 3 in the Powerplay and be the enforcer, the way he has begun practice,” Ashwin said light-heartedly in a video on his YouTube channel.
Dhoni has batted at number three only eight times in his IPL career, with the latest being in 2022. His returns have been mediocre with 196 runs at a strike-rate of 124.84.
‘How do you stup this batting lineup?’
Ashwin believes that CSK’s strength lies in its batting, with a long list of hard-hitters who’d be near impossible to consistently stop from getting 200-plus totals.
“They’ve scouted very well and boast a powerhouse of a batting lineup. Ruturaj Gaikwad, Sanju Samson, Ayush Mhatre, Dewald Brevis, Shivam Dube, Karthik Sharma, and Prashant Veer is a batting lineup, barring the inexperience in the last two, you ask how are teams going to stop this batting lineup? Even a 200 to 200 becomes really difficult for teams to stop CSK to,” Ashwin added.
