Chennai Super Kings has been one of the most successful franchises in the history of IPL, with 5 titles and 2 titles of CL T20. But in the IPL 2025 season, they have won 2 matches out of 11 and performed badly at their den, Chepauk.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru won a match against CSK after 17 years, DC won after 15 years, and SRH also got their victory 1st time at the home ground of CSK in Chennai. RCB also made history by getting two consecutive wins against CSK in IPL 2025.
Reasons behind the failure of Chennai Super Kings in IPL 2025
- Top order- Throughout the season, CSK had an inconsistent top order with Ruturaj Gaikwad batting at 3, and Rachin Ravindra was opening with Rahul Tripathi, who had performed badly. Gaikwad was well settled in the opening position, but Rahul got a chance to replace him and could not deliver, which resulted in choking in the powerplay itself.
- Misfielding- There have been many dropped catches and misfields this season by CSK, especially by Pathirana, which gave an added benefit to opponents, and as the famous phrase goes – Catches win Matches. CSK lost these chances and the match simultaneously.
- Extras- Pathirana, the main attacking bowler of CSK, bowled the maximum wide balls in the season, which reduced the pressure from batsmen for rotating the strike and resulted in big run overs even after bowling at good lengths.
- Home Ground Benefit- CSK was not able to use their ground to their advantage. Chepauk is known for spinning tracks, and their spinners were not able to capitalize on it to their advantage instead unlike Noor Ahmed, who took a 4-wicket haul for his debut in CSK against Mumbai Indians.
- Lack of intent- The intent while batting was missing in the batsman while opening or middle order, where CSK choked with a dozen runs behind the desired results, and it cost them some important matches.
- Unstable Middle-Order- In the middle order, Jadeja and Ashwin were out to bat at number 4 or 5, where Dhoni came in to bat at around the 7 position, which was too late for the team, and none in the top 5 were able to smash runs the way Dhoni could have done.
- Dhoni’s Fitness- MS Dhoni was not fully fit as he had a knee injury that had lasted for 2 years. Due to this, his running between the wickets slowed down, and he came in to bat very low to avoid any further injury so that he could play the whole season.
- Captaincy Change- Ruturaj Gaikwad was handed over the captaincy, but due to an ongoing injury in his elbow, he was ruled out in the middle of the season. This created havoc in the team.
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