Chennai Super Kings IPL History

Captain: MS Dhoni
Coach: Stephen Fleming
Home ground: MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai
IPL titles: 5 (2010, 2011, 2018, 2021, 2023)
Owners: Chennai Super Kings Cricket Ltd (subsidiary of India Cements)

Contents

Table of Contents History The highs The lows Season by season Key players Chennai Super Kings IPL History More Details Squad

Under MS Dhoni’s leadership, the Chennai Super Kings have won five titles and are the most consistent IPL team ever. They have only placed lower than fourth twice. India Cements, chaired by N. Srinivasan, the former chairman of the ICC and president of the BCCI, owns the franchise. 2008 saw the purchase of Chennai Super Kings for Rs 360 crore, or roughly US$91 million.

History

In 12 of their 14 seasons, the Super Kings have advanced to the knockout stage. Over time, Dhoni—who received the highest payment in the first auction, at Rs 9.5 crore, or around US$1.5 million—became the team’s face, heart, and soul. His intuition and the tactical acumen of coach Stephen Fleming have been essential to the Super Kings’ success throughout the years.

next their losses in the 2008 final on the last ball and the 2009 semifinal, the Super Kings won consecutive championships the next two years. Due to a spot-fixing incident, they were suspended for two years after performing poorly in the knockout stages of the following four IPLs. Nevertheless, Super Kings made a triumphant comeback in 2018 with their third championship, either in spite of or as a result of their roster’s preponderance of players over 30.

In the exciting 2019 Super Kings final, Rohit Sharma and company managed to steal a one-run victory over their notorious rivals, the Mumbai Indians. The following year, Chennai Super Kings finished close to the bottom of the table as a result of their struggles to adapt to UAE living. The following season, they recovered admirably, going about things the clinical Super Kings way, placing second in the league and defeating the Kolkata Knight Riders in the championship game. They nearly avoided the wooden spoon in 2022, but crashed and burned again, and then stormed back in 2023 to win the title a fifth time.

The highs

Super Kings, who were mocked as “Dad’s Army” before the 2018 auction, disproved the naysayers when one of their many over-30 players, Shane Watson, scored an undefeated hundred to help the team win their third IPL title. Their two-year suspended comeback was better than expected. With many of their older pros still competing, they won the title in 2021 following their worst-ever finish in 2020.

The lows

When one of CSK’s top officers, Srinivasan’s son-in-law, Gurunath Meiyappan, was detained on suspicion of fraud, forgery, and deception, the team reached its lowest point. Due to Meiyappan’s actions, the Super Kings team was also suspended two years later. 2020 was not just Dhoni’s poorest season personally, but the worst season for the Super Kings as well, as they missed the playoffs for the first time ever.

Season by season

2008: runners-up
The Super Kings won eight of their fourteen league games, and they easily defeated Kings XI Punjab in the semifinals with the seamers’ skill and the batting prowess of Dhoni and Suresh Raina. Shane Warne and Sohail Tanvir made sure that the Rajasthan Royals had a pleasant ending despite the efforts of Chennai Super Kings’s seamers and Muthiah Muralidaran to drag the match to the final ball.

2009 – fourth
When the IPL relocated to South Africa, the Super Kings finished second in the standings thanks to the combined efforts of Matthew Hayden, Raina, and Murali. But Manish Pandey and Vinay Kumar, two local youngsters from Royal Challengers Bangalore, defeated them in the semifinal.

2010: Champions
the campaign in which Dhoni emerged as Chennai’s thala. In the last over of a match that CSK had to win, their captain burned Kings XI’s Irfan Pathan for 4, 2, 6, and 6. Chennai Super Kings had looked hot and cold early in the tournament. Kieron Pollard attempted to take the game away in the final, but Dhoni set up Hayden at short mid-off to trap him, and Chennai Super Kings went on to win their maiden championship.

2011: Champions
This season, Chennai Super Kings made Chepauk a fortress, winning all of their games there, including the final against RCB. Shadab Jakati and Doug Bollinger had their moments, but R. Ashwin was the most impressive bowler. He even sent Chris Gayle out for a duck in the final, when M. Vijay shone with 95 off 52 balls. Suraj Randiv filled the void left by Murali.

2012 – runners-up
They won five of their eight league games at home, and Vijay then made it to the finals by scoring a century against Delhi Daredevils. In that championship match, Vijay, Mike Hussey, and Raina all performed admirably, but an unsung hero named Manvinder Bisla kept Dhoni’s team from winning a hat-trick of titles.

2013 – runners-up
They advanced to the qualifier thanks to a seven-game winning streak, and Hussey—who was in outstanding form that season—defeated Mumbai with an impressive 86 not out, securing a championship matchup with the same opponents. In the final, Super Kings had Mumbai down to 52 for 4, but Pollard’s undefeated sixty-two from thirty-two deliveries swung the odds in Mumbai’s favour.

2014: third
Even though they amassed 205 for 4, Chennai Super Kings’s opening game against Kings XI in Abu Dhabi ended in a loss. Nevertheless, despite having their home games moved to Ranchi because of a local conflict, they won eight of their next nine games and advanced to the playoffs once more. In the second qualifier, Raina crushed Kings XI for 87 off 25 balls, but it was insufficient to get them to the championship game.

2015: runners-up
Six out of seven home games were won during another incredible run at Chepauk. They defeated RCB in the second qualifier after winning three games en route to winning the standings. In the end, Mumbai prevailed over Chennai Super Kings a second time. Seamers dominated this IPL season, with Ashish Nehra placing fourth and Dwayne Bravo of the Super Kings at the top of the wickets lists.

2016, 2017 – suspended

2018: champions
Due to a water issue in the Cauvery River, the Super Kings relocated their home base from Chepauk to Pune after just one game. On Pune’s seam-friendly wickets, Lungi Ngidi made crucial breakthroughs, andChennai Super Kings came back to win titles by defeating Sunrisers in both the first qualifier and the final.

2019: runners-up
When Chennai Super Kings returned to Chepauk, they relied on their tried-and-true spin-to-win formula, winning six of their seven league home games. Dhoni lost the only match versus Mumbai, where he was sitting out to tend to his bothersome back. He came back for the first qualifying match, but Mumbai won both that match and the championship match, this time by a single run.

2020 – seventh
As Fleming described it, the Super Kings’ aging squad “ran out of juice” by the second half of the season after Raina and Harbhajan Singh withdrew from the tournament for personal reasons and the management chose not to select replacements. In the middle order, Dhoni and Kedar Jadhav had difficulty, as the spinners were unable to get past Chepauk.

2021: champions
Regarding the squad, not much changed, but for Chennai Super Kings, everything worked. They were as clinical as ever in the playoffs, winning four more games in the UAE after winning five of their seven games in India during the first leg. Faf du Plessis and Rituraj Gaikwad, who combined for over 600 runs this season, were the standouts.

2022 – ninth
The Super Kings’ balance was thrown off early in the season when they had to give up their overseas opener, Devon Conway, for bowling cover due to injuries to Deepak Chahar and Adam Milne. After succeeding Dhoni as captain, Ravindra Jadeja gave it back halfway through the competition. Jadeja then left the scene hurt. Super Kings came in second to last place.

2023: champions
They lost four of their first nine games due to their early stumbles before getting going. With 672 runs, Conway was their leading scorer while he was back in the saddle. In the last three games, they had defeated the Gujarat Titans twice, who, on the other hand, appeared unbeatable. One of the tightest bowlers of the competition was Jadeja, who made ten runs off the final two balls of the match to win it.

Key players

MS Dhoni
In order to lead the Super Kings to triumphs, Dhoni still follows his gut when analytics alter the T20 scene. Even though his recent power-hitting has decreased, he can still win games for his team. In Chennai, Dhoni has definitely become a cult figure.

Suresh Raina
Like Dhoni, Raina was a fan favorite, amassing the most run total for the team to date (4687) and missing just one game in ten seasons with the Super Kings before deciding not to participate in the 2020 tournament. However, like Dhoni, Raina was not retained by Chennai Super Kings in the 2022 auction and was not sold in the IPL.

Dwayne Bravo
Bravo became Dhoni’s go-to bowler at the end of the game. Bravo became the first player to reach 500 wickets in T20 cricket. He retired in 2021 and became a bowling coach at Chennai Super Kings. In the 2013 IPL, Bravo took 32 wickets in 18 matches at an economy of 7.95, a joint record. Bravo has several variations in his repertoire, including the slower dipping yorker.

Ravindra Jadeja
Jadeja’s bond with Chennai Super Kings is so strong that it is easy to forget he is played for three other IPL teams. He is a tight and efficient bowler, a solid hitter lower down the order, and an electric player in the field. He is also their second-highest wicket-taker of all time, a record he solidified with 20 wickets in their 2023 title-winning campaign.

Deepak Chahar
After being acquired by the Super Kings in the 2018 auction, Chahar—who was initially thought of as a batting all-arounder—established himself as a powerplay swing bowler. The following season, he showed up with a knuckleball and a back-of-a-length offcutter in his repertoire. In the 2022 auction, Chennai Super Kings paid Rs 14 crore (US$1.8 million) to acquire him back, but he was sidelined by injuries.

Team records