MS Dhoni-led Chennai Super Kings (CSK) is back to the top of the table with a 22-run win over Ravichandran Ashwin’s Kings XI Punjab at the Chepauk stadium.
The visitors were on course when KL Rahul and Sarfraz Khan added a 110 partnership for the third wicket before the former’s dismissal made things more difficult for them. Deepak Chahar and Scott Kuggeleijn held their nerves in the end, but they were buoyed by a brilliant spell from Harbhajan Singh whose two for 17 allowed CSK to make early inroads.
Faf Du Plessis’ 38-ball 54 combined with a 60-run stand between Dhoni and Ambati Rayudu took CSK to eventually a winning total.
However, during one of the overs when Dhoni and Rayudu were batting, the umpire Rod Tucker was seen talking to the CSK skipper and warned him about something. The incident took place in the last over the first innings when Mohammed Shami was bowling. Rayudu was at the non-strikers’ end and was backing up too far in order to take a quick run.
The on-field umpires spotted the same and to avoid a possible ‘mankading’ Tucker was quick to approach Dhoni and tell him about the same. Rayudu, on the other end, wasn’t happy with the umpire’s call and though only one delivery was left in the over, there was chaos in between for a couple of minutes.
The replays also clearly showed that Rayudu was backing up too much and was correctly warned by the umpires to avoid any other controversy in the ongoing IPL.
The incident proves that the umpires have been made aware after the controversial dismissal of Jos Buttler earlier in the tournament. In Match 4, Ravichandran Ashwin had mankaded Buttler for backing up and a lot of comments were made regarding the ‘Spirit of the game’. Rather it was a legal dismissal but the outburst after the mankading was huge.
