Jaipur, Rajasthan

Chennai Super Kings captain MS Dhoni feels leaking runs in the Powerplay and at the death overs eventually put pressure on his team as CSK lost to Rajasthan Royals for the second time in IPL 2023 in Jaipur on Thursday. Dhoni, whose side was on a winning spree before this game, even praised RR’s opener Yashasvi Jaiswal, who scored a brilliant 77 and talked highly of young Matheesha Pathirana for his superb show with the ball in hand. 

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Rajasthan batted first, and the attacking pair of Jaiswal and Buttler made most of the conditions, hitting 86 for the first wicket, with most of the runs coming in the Powerplay overs – something MS Dhoni also addressed in the post-match presentation. 

While Chennai made a comeback in the middle overs, picking up wickets and halting Rajasthan’s momentum, Dhurv Jurel and Devdutt Padikkal put their foot on the gas and helped RR breach the 200-run-mark in Jaipur for the first time in IPL history.

ALSO READ: IPL 2023, Match 38: Punjab Kings vs Lucknow Super Giants - Match Preview and Result Prediction

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"It was quite a bit above par score. The reason was the first six overs, we gave away too many in the first six. At the same time, the wicket was best to bat on at that period. Then our bowlers bowled well in the middle overs but even when we were finishing, there were a few edges that went for boundaries and that actually kept adding to the score. If I just go through it, maybe there were at least five or six boundaries with edges and that had a very big impact on the score. I think they got a par-plus score and we were not able to get a good start in the first six overs," MS Dhoni said during the post-match presser.

CSK’s x-factor, Matheesha Pathirana, went for 48 runs in his four overs, including 33 from the two overs he bowled in death; however, Dhoni feels despite these numbers, the young Sri Lankan was right on top of his game and bowled well instead. 

"You have to accept it because you don't look at the scorecard. What you are looking at is how the ball was delivered, where it was and where the boundary went. These things help you take better decisions and I felt his bowling was very good, it was not like he bowled badly. Yes, there will be a few deliveries where the batsmen will play the big shot but other than that I think the scorecard doesn't really reflect how well he bowled," the CSK captain added.

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On the other hand, he also praised young left-handed Jaiswal, who played beautiful shots and kept the scoring rate above run-a-ball throughout his innings. MS added Yashasvi calculated the risks very well.

"Yashasvi batted really well, it was important to go after the bowlers, and I think he took calculated risks. It felt it was slightly easy with our bowlers because they had to assess as to what is a good length to bowl. As a captain, you can tell them initially that you want to be slightly on the shorter side," Dhoni said while praising young Jaiswal.

Meanwhile, despite Chennai losing to RR for the second time this season, they remain in the top three with five wins from eight matches. They will next take on Punjab Kings at home on Sunday.