Former Team India batter Robin Uthappa made a big statement regarding MS Dhoni amid mounting buzz over his retirement ahead of the Indian Premier League (IPL) fixture between Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) on Saturday.
Robin Uthappa, who spent a considerable amount of time with MS Dhoni during his association with CSK a few years back, is of the opinion that the 2011 World Cup-winning cricketer will not retire from the IPL this season.
“Coming to CSK, is this MS's last run? I don't think so, personally, I don't think so. But, do they want to spoil RCB's party? Definitely. Ruturaj, I think, would want to get to the knockoout stage in his first season as captain. That will be a huge confidence booster for him and for CSK. It's one for the long run. Let's see where that goes,” Robin Uthappa told JioCinema.
CSK will play their last league game against Virat Kohli's RCB at the M. Chinnaswamy during the weekend, and speculation is rife that it could be MS Dhoni's final match in the cash-rich league.
The former Team India captain underwent knee surgery last year.
While CSK's management has been managing his workload, sending him to bat lower down the order, pundits feel that his body can no longer survive the rigors of top-level cricket for almost two months, considering that the 42-year-old doesn't play any other form of the sport during the rest of the year.
Interestingly, despite the constraints he has to deal with this season due to injury, MS Dhoni still has impressive numbers in IPL 2024.
MS Dhoni's performance in the death overs has been phenomenal, to say the least. For instance, he smashed Hardik Pandya for three consecutive sixes in a match against Mumbai Indians earlier in the tournament.
Overall, MS Dhoni has made 136 runs in 13 fixtures in the 17th edition of the IPL, and what's astounding about his stats is his strike rate of 226.67
Like everyone else, former CSK batter Michael Hussey is clueless about MS Dhoni's impending plans. However, he wished to see MS Dhoni continue for a few more years.
“Your guess is as good as mine at this stage. He keeps his cards very, very close to his chest. We are hoping he does keep going,” Michael Hussey noted.
“He is still batting so well. He does prepare well – he gets into the camp very early and hits a lot of balls. He has been in good touch all season really. I guess we just got to try to manage him from the body side of things. He had a knee surgery after the last season. So he has been managing that from the initial stage of the tournament,” he elaborated.
“From a personal point of view, I hope he keeps going for another couple of years. But we will just have to wait and see. He is the only one who will make that call. And he likes to sort of build the drama a little bit as well. So I wouldn't expect a decision anytime soon,” the Australian batting stalwart continued.
“I know fans probably want to see him batting a little bit higher in the order. But that [the knee surgery] is why we have had to manage him a little bit and he only comes in at the back end. But there has been no one better in being able to come in and hit the ball so cleanly from ball one than MS. He has been phenomenal,” he underlined.
Earlier, Michael Hussey revealed the shocking episode when MS Dhoni decided to hand over the baton of CSK's captaincy to Ruturaj Gaikwad ahead of the start of the 2024 season of the IPL.
MS Dhoni has been associated with CSK since its inception in 2008.
During his long 14-year stint as captain of the Chennai-based side, he guided them to five IPL titles, including last year when CSK joined Mumbai Indians atop the list of the most successful teams in the elite T20 competition.
Michael Hussey stated that MS Dhoni's decision to step down from CSK's captaincy left him in shock. In addition to him, other cricket pundits and fans were also surprised by his move.
“MS sort of announced that he was not going to be attending the pre-tournament captains meeting. And we're like, ‘Oh, no. What's going on?'. He said Ruturaj was going to be captain from then on. So it was a little bit of a shock to start with but it has been managed really well,” Michael Hussey said on ESPNCricinfo.
“I know Stephen Fleming [head coach] had been working closely with Ruturaj in the lead-up to the tournament. In fact, he has been grooming him for a couple of years now. We have sort of known for a little while that he was the right man to take over the job when MS decided to step aside,” the former Australian batter added.
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