Despite the fact that Suresh Raina has exited from the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020 citing personal reasons, his stint with the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) seems in jeopardy even next year as the franchise might part ways with him before the 14th edition. The CSK camp based in Dubai reported 13 COVID-19 cases, including two players — Deepak Chahar and Ruturaj Gaikwad, a development which an IPL source of NDTV said, played a role in the recently-retired India player’s exit from the event starting September 19.
However, some of the recent reports have also suggested that the team management was not particularly happy with the 32-year-old’s “conduct” during the quarantine time, something which hasn’t gone down well with the CSK owner and former BCCI president N Srinivasan.
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Describing the same, one of the sources of NDTV in IPL said, “In CSK, the norm is that the coach, captain and the manager get suites. However, Raina also gets a suite in any hotel that the franchise stays. It’s just that his room didn’t have a balcony. It was an issue but I don’t think big enough to warrant a comeback (to India). There could be something more than just the scare of rising COVID-caseload in Chennai.”
The source also explained that in the current scenario it can be said that Raian has been gone for CSK not only for this season but also for the next IPL scheduled in April 2021. Chennai’s favorite ‘Chinna Thala’ may not wear the canary yellow again.
When asked if by any chance Raina can make a comeback this season, the source replied, “He is unavailable this season and that is clear from the official statement issued by the CSK. Now there are certain things that have not gone down too well with the top people. It looks highly improbable that someone who has retired and likely won’t play any cricket will come back for CSK. Maybe, he will be back in the auction and someone else might pick him.”
Now, CSK will become hugely dependent o young Ruturaj, expecting that he will come good once he completes the quarantine and rejoins the training session after two negative tests. On the speculated bio-bubble breach of Raina, the source said an apology from Raina will have little impact given that the team has already started looking for other opportunities.
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The source elaborate, “I don’t know about the apology part but CSK will now be eyeing to prepare Ruturaj looking at the future and Dhoni and Fleming will rejig their strategy accordingly.”
Raina is CSK’s highest run-scorer as he has amassed as many as 4527 runs from 164 IPL games. The southpaw is also the second-highest scorer in IPL history with 5368 runs, second only to Indian skipper Virat Kohli’s tally of 5412 runs.
