Toss Chennai Super Kings chose to bat v Kings XI Punjab
MS Dhoni opted to bat in hot conditions in Chennai on what he said was a good track to bat on initially. After expressing his displeasure about the pitch that had been prepared for the tournament opener last month, on Saturday Dhoni said, “Groundsmen have done a good job.”
Super Kings made a forced change because of Dwayne Bravo’s injury and also left out Mohit Sharma and Shardul Thakur, whom batting coach Michael Hussey had identified as possible replacements as death bowlers for Bravo. Instead, they handed an IPL debut to New Zealand allrounder Scott Kuggeleijn and brought in Faf du Plessis and Harbhajan Singh.
Kings XI Punjab captain R Ashwin, who was “emotional” to be back playing in his home city, said he would have opted to bat too but hoped the pitch remained the same through the 40 overs. He made two changes for the overseas slots: Chris Gayle and Andrew Tye replaced Mujeeb Ur Rahman and Hardus Viljoen.
Chennai Super Kings: 1 Shane Watson, 2 Faf du Plessis, 3 Ambati Rayudu, 4 Suresh Raina, 5 Kedar Jadhav, 6 MS Dhoni (capt & wk), 7 Ravindra Jadeja, 8 Scott Kuggeleijn, 9 Deepak Chahar, 10 Harbhajan Singh, 11 Imran Tahir
Kings XI Punjab: 1 KL Rahul (wk), 2 Chris Gayle, 3 Mayank Agarwal, 4 Sarfaraz Khan, 5 Mandeep Singh, 6 David Miller, 7 Sam Curran, 8 R Ashwin (capt), 9 M Ashwin, 10 Andrew Tye, 11 Mohammed Shami