Former England batsman Kevin Pietersen said he did not buy into MS Dhoni’s defense of his approach to bat at No. 7 and ‘try a few different things’ during Chennai Super Kings’ 16-run defeat to Rajasthan Royals in their Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020 meeting on Tuesday in Sharjah.
Kevin Pietersen said It’s advisable to stick to the team’s strengths and not get into too much experimentation in a tournament like IPL, which ‘can bite’ back very, very quickly.
MS Dhoni dropped himself down the order and walked in at No. 7 despite the asking rate shooting up in Chennai Super Kings’ failed chase of 217 in Sharjah. Dhoni arrived at the middle when 103 were needed off 38 balls. The CSK captain kept knocking singles and managed just 9 runs in 12 balls until the 19th over. Dhoni hit 3 massive sixes in the final over but CSK had already lost the game by then.
“Yeah, you got to get up. You have to at least give yourself the opportunity to win the game. That’s what Sunny is talking about,” Kevin Pietesen told Star Sports during a post-match analysis show.
“When you see how close they went, Du Plessis started to go, then MS Dhoni started hitting at the end and then they lost by only 16 runs.
“So we were talking about a 4 or 5-over period when they were just knocking it around, knocking it around and running silly singles. They could have caught the game up there with a little bit of intent. They could have easily knocked this score off. If you need 20 in the last over, you can win this game.
“It’s not about experiments, saying ‘oh it’s early on in the tournament’. Let me tell you, T20 cricket can bite you very, very quickly. You can end up losing five games on the go very quickly and then you can end up thinking ‘oh my goodness, are we actually going to get into the finals?’. I am not buying into this nonsense.”‘
When Dhoni defended his decision to bat at No. 7
Pietersen’s comments came after MS Dhoni defended his decision to bat at No. 7, saying CSK are trying out different combinations and they can always go back to their strengths if they don’t work out.
“we want to try a few different things, like sending Sam or Jadeja. That’s something we haven’t done for a very long time and this gives us an opportunity to do that at the start of the tournament,” Dhoni said.
“As the tournament progresses, you will see the senior players stepping in and taking that added responsibility.
“Otherwise, we have been one team that has kept doing the same thing. I feel we have an opportunity to try a few different things. if it doesn’t work, we can go back to what our strength is.”
You got to go in with belief: Gavaskar on Dhoni’s approach
Meanwhile, batting great Sunil Gavaskar slammed Dhoni’s approach, saying it was difficult to understand why Dhoni walked in at No. 7 when chasing a mammoth total. Gavaskar pointed out that having young Ruturaj Gaikwad play higher up the order on his debut when the asking rate was shooting up wasn’t the ideal way to approach the chase.
“We can’t surmise that in the previous, he sent in Sam Curran ahead of him and Curran got 18 off 6 deliveries. Curran did well again, he hit a couple of sixes.
“And then I thought he might come in after that instead of sending young Ruturaj Gaikwad because when the opposition has got 216 means he has to start playing his shots from the word go. It’s not going to be easy for him. If the opposition had got 160-170, then by all means, send in Ruturaj so he can maybe play himself in.
“But coming into bat after 5 wickets is like he had decided this match is not going to be won. And that’s no way to approach any target. You got to go in with the belief you will be able to win it,” Gavaskar said.
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