The IPL 2025 season has seen the pitches take centre stage at most venues, with several home teams not pleased with the nature of strips offered by the curators at their respective grounds. After the initial fallout and subsequent patch-up between the Kolkata Knight Riders team and the Eden Gardens curator, Royal Challengers Bengaluru assistant coach Dinesh Karthik had lamented the slow strips despite requesting for better pitches at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium following his side’s second home defeat.
On Monday, Chennai Super Kings captain MS Dhoni joined in on the pitch talk after his side snapped their five-match losing streak with a five-wicket triumph away at the Ekana Stadium over Lucknow Super Giants. Following their opening game victory against Mumbai Indians last month at the MA Chidambaram Stadium, a reeling CSK unit dropped three successive matches at the Chepauk cauldron for the first time in history. CSK’s fledgling batting unit and their slow-scoring nature had come under heavy criticism following their nine-wicket loss against Kolkata Knight Riders in Chennai last week. Batting first CSK only mustered 103 for nine in 20 overs before KKR waltzed through the chase in under 11 overs.
‘Need better pitches’
Reflecting on CSK’s precarious situation despite their second win, Dhoni addressed the need for better batting surfaces in Chennai.
“If you see the powerplay, whether it was the combination or the conditions, we were struggling with the ball. And then we weren’t able to get the start we wanted as a batting unit. Also, the fall of wickets. We keep losing wickets at the wrong time to some extent.
“One of the reasons could be that the Chennai wicket is slightly on the slower side. When we have played away from home, the batting unit has done slightly better. Maybe we need to play on wickets that are slightly better so that it’ll give the batters confidence to play their shots. You don’t want to play timid cricket,” Dhoni said in the post-match chat.
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