MS Dhoni and Phil Salt in action© X (Twitter)
Royal Challengers Bengaluru created history on Friday as they defeated their Southern rivals Chennai Super Kings by 50 runs in the IPL 2025 match. The victory was a historic one because it was RCB’s first win over CSK at the iconic Chepauk ground after a hiatus of 17 years. Asked to bat first, RCB posted a whopping total of 196/7 in 20 overs with skipper Rajat Patidar scoring 51 off 32 balls. Later, the visitors restricted CSK to 146/8 and won the game by 50 runs. Despite being on the losing end, CSK fans were thrilled to see the legendary MS Dhoni at his absolute best.
Before coming out to bat and scoring a quick 30* off 16 balls, Dhoni impressed his fans with his vintage style wicketkeeping. In the 5th over of RCB’s innings, Dhoni showed his alertness and stumped out Phil Salt for 32 on Noor Ahmad‘s delivery.
Though fans were taken aback by Dhoni’s quick stumping even at the age of 43, former India batter Virender Sehwag was not so impressed.
Speaking about the stumping on Cricbuzz, Sehwag said, “It’s not like that it was a very wonderful stumping. Any normal wicketkeeper could have done it because his (Salt) leg was already out and he did not even try to bring it back into the crease.”
“I don’t know what conversation took place between Dhoni and Noor Ahmad. Whether he told Noor to keep bowling outside thinking Salt will step out. If that’s the case then it’s good. But still, there’s no doubt that MS is doing some great wicketkeeping at this age,” he added.
Dhoni entertained his fans with the bat as well as scored an unbeaten 30 off just 16 balls. This included three boundaries and two maximums. However, all this went in vain as CSK fell short by 50 runs.
“To be honest, I still feel 170 was a par score on this wicket. It wasn’t that great to bat. Bad day in the fielding cost us really badly. At the end of the day, when you are chasing 170, you bat differently. You have little bit time when you go in to bat. When you’re chasing 20 runs extra on a wicket where you know it’s going to be a little bit sticky and it’s going to stop after the ball gets old, you have to bat slightly differently in the powerplay,” said CSK skipper Ruturaj Gaikwad after the loss.
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