One of the most loved Indian Premier League (IPL) franchises Chennai Super Kings (CSK) started their IPL 2019 campaign with a bang on Saturday when they thrashed Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in the opening game of this season. The irony is that both the teams have won their respective season openers that too with a bang. While CSK defeated Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in the tournament opener in Chennai by a huge margin and Delhi thrashed Mumbai Indians (MI) in Mumbai.
Despite the fact that Delhi has always underperformed in most of the IPL seasons, they started on a high this year and hence, the defending champions will be in no mood of taking a team like this lightly. However, any given day, CSK looks stronger than ever and there are certain chances that they will defend their title this year. However, at home, Delhi can be a team to beat, especially after seeing their batting performance in the opening game and Delhi pitch has always been a batsman’s paradise.
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In IPL 2018, the fans got an impression that one can never write off CSK as despite being called as Dad’s army last season, is a team that looked ready since they won the cup last year and could be very difficult for other teams to get past them this year. Our money is on CSK to notch up yet another victory at the Feroz Shah Kotla in IPL 2019.
Delhi Capitals (DC)
Delhi played their first game against MI and won the game by 37 runs. Pant was the star performer for DC and tore Mumbai’s bowling lineup apart with some clean hitting. Colin Ingram and Shikhar Dhawan were also batting well before throwing their wicket away.
DC is expected to field the same XI which played against Mumbai. Colin Ingram, Keemo Paul, Kagiso Rabada and Trent Boult will be four overseas players for them while the rest of the players are likely to keep their place in the team.
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Probable XI: Shikhar Dhawan, Prithvi Shaw, Shreyas Iyer (C), Colin Ingram, Rishabh Pant (WK), Keemo Paul, Axar Patel, Rahul Tewatiya, Kagiso Rabada, Trent Bolt, Ishant Sharma.
Chennai Super Kings (CSK)
Chennai played their opening game against RCB. The game played at MA Chidambaram Stadium was a low scoring contest and spin bowlers enjoyed their outing. The track of Chepauk was a rank turner and CSK skipper MS Dhoni criticized the curator for such pitch. However, Feroz Shah Kotla can be expected to be a belter which will be suitable for both sides.
Chennai fielded with three regular spinners against RCB and Dhoni can retain the same playing XI against Delhi as well. Delhi pitch has been assisting spinners in the recent past and Imran Tahir, Harbhajan Singh, and Ravindra Jadeja can run heroics in Kotla as well.
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Probable XI: Shane Watson, Ambati Rayudu, Suresh Raina, MS Dhoni (C/WK), Kedar Jadhav, Ravindra Jadeja, Dwayne Bravo, Harbhajan Singh, Imran Tahir, Shardul Thakur, Deepak Chahar.
