Relishing the opportunity to take on defending champions Mumbai Indians in their opener after returning to the Indian Premier League after a two-year gap, Chennai Super Kings (CSK) head coach Stephen Fleming on Friday said there are nerves in the camp but “no more than normal”.

“I think we are well prepared. It’s just a lot of nerves around, but no more than normal. Players want to get into it and we’ve had the best part of 12 days leading into the competition. The general feeling is we’re just ready to go,” Fleming said on the eve of their match against MI at the Wankhede Stadium here.

“It’s a great rivalry and this is what the competition needs. We couldn’t have asked for a better game to start with. A game of this intensity at this ground is always a thrill. So the players are excited about it,” he added.

Asked if he feels CSK spent a lot of players who are over the hill, Fleming said, “I’m not sure when a young player came out and was the top run-scorer. You get some exceptions, like Rashid Khan (Afghanistan) and Washington Sundar. But there’s only a handful, whereas experienced players play major parts in the whole tournament, so that’s why I value experience.

“There’s also about the quality of player, like (Dwayne) Bravo is still competing well, (Shane) Watson’s competing well, Harbhajan (Singh) has great skill sets and Dhoni is a fine leader. So the players we’ve picked, I don’t think they are spent by any means. It is a year-by-year proposition and this year I think they look very good.”

Fleming, a former New Zealand captain, further added that South Africa captain Faf du Plessis won’t play on Saturday due to his finger injury.