XtraTime Web Desk: A couple of days ago when CSK lost three matches on the in the Indian Premier League 2020, their veteran opener Shane Watson assured the CSK fans through a tweet that The perfect game for @ChennaiIPL is coming!!!. And in the match against Kings XI Punjab Watson kept his words with a brilliant 83-run knock in Dubai.
Chennai Super Kings faced Kings XI Punjab in the 18th match of the Indian Premier League. Batting first, Punjab put up a decent total of 178 runs in 20 overs. Captain KL Rahul was the star performer of the side as he scored 63 of 52 balls. Nicolas Pooran scored quick 33 runs in just 17 balls.
Chennai Super Kings did no wrong in the second innings. They comfortably won the match by 10 wickets as the openers Watson and Du Plessis had a partnership of 181 runs. Watson scored 83 of 53 balls while Du Plessis scored 87 of 53 balls. With this, Chennai finally won a match after 3 consecutive losses. However, the misery for Kings XI Punjab continues.
Shane Watson was handed the Man of the Match trophy following his tremendous batting. In the post match conference Watson talked about the things that went wrong in the previous matches and how he managed to fix that. “I felt like something that been slightly off, technically. So it was nice for it to come off. Just a combination of technique and intent. Was able to get the weight through the ball a lot better.”
About his partnership with Faf he said, “We do complement each other well. There are bowlers he [Faf] prefers to take on and he’s a great guy and good batting with him. With so much experience and success the franchise have had, they believe in the players. We just knew we had to do a few things better. It came together.”
Faf Du Plessis may not have won the Man of the Match but he played an important role for CSK to win. After winning the match for CSK, Du Plessis said, “Yeah it’s going well. I think the big thing for me is that I’m there at the end. It’s been a big focus for me to try and convert better. Grateful that we could get the partnership going tonight.”
Faf also gave his viewpoint about the team. “I thought the previous game we were much better bowling, our team balance was better, but we didn’t bat well. With batting it’s confidence so we just wanted to make sure the batsmen get some confidence. Hopefully, surely but surely, our players can find form maybe towards the next few games.”
Faf also acknowledged the impact of the captain and the coach. He said, “Credit to Dhoni and Fleming, it’s obviously the CSK way, they stick with players a bit longer than other teams might. They stick with players that they feel will play in the final. Credit to the management. It’s not always as easy as it looks.”
KXIP now lost 4 out of their 5 games. Captain KL Rahul in the post match conference said, “Look it’s hard being on the losing side for so many games, we’ve just got to keep trying harder. There’s no rocket science, we know where we’re going wrong. The execution part’s been bad.”
Rahul further gave a clear view what he thought about the match – “I thought 178 was a good score. The wicket stopped a bit when we started batting, we felt like 170-180 was par on this wicket. But we know if we don’t get wickets against players of this class, we’ll struggle. We can attack and look for wickets if you’re going 7-8 an over, but when you’re going 10 an over at the start it’s a little difficult to be aggressive.”