AB de Villiers bats for MS Dhoni as CSK captain over Ruturaj Gaikwad

Former Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) batter, AB de Villiers, is of the view that MS Dhoni should be leading Chennai Super Kings (CSK) as long as he is playing in the Indian Premier League (IPL). Dhoni handed over the captaincy armband on the eve of the start of thetournaamentto Gaikwad, much to the surprise of the fans.

While CSK under Gaikwad startedoffsparklingly, the franchise could not deliver consistent results and eventually crashed out in the league stage after losing to Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) in the virtual knockout last week.

"I will only give you an honest answer if you're going to report it in the right way yes so I wouldn't say I called it a mistake. What I meant by that was with MS Dhoni around, playing against MS for so many years, that is the most intimidating sight to have him as an opposing captain," said De Villiers onJio Cinema.

"They took away quite a bit of the intimidation factor from CSK with not having him as captain. It's got nothing to do with Gaikwad's captaincy. Iactuallythink he's got a very bright future and he captained extremely well," he added.

While it was Gaikwad's maiden captaincy assignment with CSK, it was only the third time in 17 years that the five-time champions had failed to advance to the knockouts.

Dhoni's future uncertain

Although most fans and pundits would love to have Dhoni back in thecapatincychair, it remains uncertain at this stage if the former Indian captain would be back, even as a player next season.

CSK CEO Kasi Viswanathan recently said there had not been "any discussions" regardingDhoni's future, and that the former CSK captain would inform them about his decision at the right time.

“There were no discussions in the dressing room about it. We have never asked him about his future and neither has he said anything about it. When he takes a decision, he will inform us, until then we will not interfere,"Viswanathan toldThe Indian Expressnewspaper.

CSK have to make the tough call on players it wants to hold onto ahead of the mega auctions planned by the BCCI. Since Dhoni is a luxury squad player at this stage in his career, retaining him will be a high risk for the franchise.

If BCCI changes the retention rules and increasesthe number of players a club can retain, it couldpossiblyinfluence Dhoni's decision as to whether or not to come back to play for the cricket-loving Chennai crowd.

(With inputs from agencies)