Chennai Super Kings 169 for 4 (Hussey 65*, Dhoni 44) beat Delhi Daredevils 83 (Mohit Sharma 3-10, Ashwin 2-18) by 86 runs
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In the school of Chennai Super Kings cricket, they swear by a formula.
Ten times six plus ten times 10 equals a winning total on a slow pitch.
The corollary is, ten times six often begets ten times ten. On Thursday,
Super Kings followed that formula like front-benching geeks. They
reached 60 for 1 in 10 overs, then switched gears to score 109 in the
last 10 with Michael Hussey and MS Dhoni turning it on like only they
can. The chase was killed by the time Virender Sehwag joined David
Warner and Mahela Jayawardene back in the dugout. Delhi Daredevils have
lost all of their six matches in this year's IPL.
It was an all too familiar sight with Hussey back in the side and Super
Kings biding their time at the start of the match, sizing up their prey.
Suresh Raina seemed to struggle to find his touch a bit, but they
reached that preliminary 60 in 10 without much drama. Just like that
Raina drove Umesh Yadav over cover in the 11th over, and Super Kings
were on their way.
In the next over, when Hussey pulled Ajit Agarkar over midwicket for a
six, his strike rate finally crossed a run a ball. Despite Raina's
wicket, the five overs immediately after the 10th went for 9, 14, 11, 10
and 12. A bit of it had to do with Dhoni, who not only finally came out
to bat at four, but came with the switch flicked on that told him he
didn't need to block at the start of the innings.
The first ball Dhoni faced he pulled disdainfully through midwicket for
four, and you knew bad things were going to happen to bowlers. And then,
horror of horrors, Agarkar, one of the best fielders among Indian
quicks, dropped him at long-off. Dhoni would have gone for 17 off 10 had
it been taken. That was also a period when Daredevils were trying to
play games with that formula of ten times 10.
That Yadav over brought only seven, and in the next over Irfan Pathan
conceded just four of the first five balls. Hussey, though, drilled the
last one through long-off to reopen the flood gates. He went from 24 off
27 to 65 not out off 50. And Dhoni, by the time he played a dot ball
he had reached 32 off 15, and would go on to add 12 off eight more.
The thing with Daredevils, though, is you can't count them out lest one
of their big three has a crazy day with the bat. Haryana quick Mohit
Sharma, coming back like Hussey, quickly put paid to that. First he got a
bottom edge from Warner, and then had Sehwag holing out to deep
midwicket. In between, Chris Morris got Jayawardene lbw. After that
Dwayne Bravo kept taking catches and danced into the night.
Sidharth Monga is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo
Feeds: Sidharth Monga
© ESPN EMEA Ltd.
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