Chennai Super Kings captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni is under fire for a bunch of reasons, mainly for the lacklustre performance the franchise has displayed so far in the ongoing edition of the Indian Premier League. On Monday, he invited sharp criticism from former India cricketer Kris Srikkanth for saying that he “did not see spark in some of our youngsters”.
CSK has won only three of 10 matches and are currently in the bottom of the IPL points table after their 7-wicket loss against Rajasthan Royals.
During the post-match presentation, Dhoni said that he is yet to see a spark in the youngsters in the team so as to make changes in their squad.
“You don’t want to chop and change. Insecurity is something you don’t want to prevail in the dressing room. Also the youngsters, we didn’t see the spark to push the guys,” Dhoni said.
“But what this result has done is give those youngsters a chance in the rest of the tournament. Maybe going forward we bring them in and they play without pressure,” he added.
However, Srikkanth is far from convinced of the skipper’s argument, and questioned the inclusion of players such as Kedar Jadhav and Piyush Chawla in the playing XI.
“I won’t accept what Dhoni is saying. This talk of process, process... I won’t agree with that. You’re talking about process, but the process of selection itself is wrong,” he said, adding that 24-year-old N. Jagadeesan showed spark.
“A guy like Jagadeesan... you’re saying youngsters don’t have spark, does Kedar Jadhav have spark? Did Piyush Chawla show spark? Come on, this is all ridiculous, I will not accept his (Dhoni’s) answers today. By going on and on about the process, CSK’s tournament is going to end,” the 1983 World Cup-winning cricketer added while speaking to Star Sports Tamil.
Jadhav has scored only 62 runs from eight matches in the IPL so far
“At least Karn Sharma was getting wickets even if he was expensive. Piyush Chawla was brought into the attack after the match was done and dusted.
Srikkanth further said that he had no doubt that Dhoni is a great cricketer, but reiterated that he won’t accept the CSK captain’s comments that the ball didn’t grip.
“Dhoni is a great cricketer, there is no doubt about that but I won’t accept him saying that the ball didn’t grip. I won’t accept that,” he said.
