Match I: Super Kings started their season again with a loss, in their home ground, in a tight match against Mumbai Indians. Though the bowlers started restricting and take regular wickets,
Pollard's onslaught helped Mumbai Indians reach 148. Super Kings batsmen stumbled through the chase with many of them falling for cheap shots. The skipper and captain of Chennai Super Kings
Mahendra Singh Dhoni got the Chennai Super Kings back into the game by a scoring an amazing 51 of just 26 ball including 5 boundaries and 3 maximums and a strike rate of 196.15. He played superbly and was going for a maximum when he got out with Pollard taking the catch of MSD, once again proved the match winner for Mumbai Indians
Match II: In the second match at Mohali, CSK won over KXIP with an astounding 10 wicket win. Winning the toss and opting to bowl, CSK's bowlers were constantly taking the wickets and bowled out KXIP for 138. David Hussey and Gurkeerat Singh helped KXIP to stabilize in the middle overs until Ashwin and Bravo struck back. Michael Hussey and Murali Vijay started the chase in a slow and steady manner. Once they were settled Hussey's blows made the run chase too easy with CSK winning it with 10 wickets and 16 balls to spare. Vijay playing the second fiddle reached his half century in run a ball. Mike Hussey was awarded Man of the Match for his clean-hit 86 off 54 balls.
Match III: CSK's third match was one of the best matches in all of the IPL so far. the Arch-rivals of
CSK, RCB made 165 with the help of Kohli's 58 and AB De Villiers' cracking 64 off 32 balls. Batting CSK lost its openers cheaply at a poor runrate. Badrinath and Raina doing the repairs at the middle stages, Dhoni and Jadeja tweaking in the pre-last stages, CSK was made to get 29 runs from last 11 balls when Dhoni got out. With short cameos from Bravo and Morris, it was all down to Ravindra Jadeja to score 2 runs in the last ball. Off which, he gave a catch to the third man. Kohli was rejoicing the win and seeing the umpire giving the
no-ball, it was confirmed a CSK's win. Post Match, many Jadeja's jokes started to revolve the Internet. MSD tweeted "When you give Sir Ravindra Jadeja one ball to get 2 runs he will win it with one ball to spare !!"
Match IV: Playing their 3rd game at home and facing a relatively low-threatening
Pune Warriors India, CSK played one of its most lethargic display at the field. Bringing in
Anirudha and
Albie Morkel in the team for
Mike Hussey and Mohit Sharma, CSK nowhere showed the wish to win the game. Pune dominated from the first with the power hitting of Aaron Finch and late surge from Steven Smith. Pune reached a competitive 159.CSK lost the game by 24 runs.
Match V: CSK played against the
Delhi Daredevils who are struggling to record their first win this season. CSK chose to bat first after winning the toss and set a pretty solid target of 170.
Michael Hussey and
Mahendra Singh Dhoni played their game with good support from
Suresh Raina. DD started their wobbly innings with
David Warner cheaply gone for 1 run and wickets continued to fall in short intervals. DD were dismissed for 83 runs. DD required 9 wins from their remaining 10 matches to improve their standing in the tournament.
Match VI: CSK played their 6th match against the struggling Kolkata Knight Riders. KKR captain Gautam Gambhir won the toss and elected to bat. Skipper Gautam Gambhir and all-rounder Yusuf Pathan gave them a brisk start of 25 off 19 and 25 off 22 respectively. But soon Morris stuck for his team and an excellent catch by Hussey to get rid of Gautam Gambhir. Soon Yusuf pathan also was run-out by a quick throw by Bravo. In the end of the first innings KKR could only manage 119/6 in their 20 overs. CSK started off well but soon lost wickets at regular intervals. M. Hussey played a vital innings of 40 off 51 balls though it was slow in the context of the game . With 48 to win from 24, Ravindra Jadeja arrived at the crease and struck an awesome cameo of 36 off just 14 delivered the goods and took CSK past the line. CSK in the end won the encounter by 5 wickets and 5 balls to spare.
Match VII: Playing their 4th match in their home ground,
CSK once again lost the toss was asked to bowl by the
Rajasthan Royals captain
Rahul Dravid. Batting first, RR off to a flier with
Watson going all guns blazing. Though one team wickets were sliding, RR reached 185 helped by a magnificent century by Watson and some late power-hits by
Stuart Binny. CSK while chasing lost
Vijay cheaply once again within the Powerplays. With some fluent hits by
Michael Hussey and heavy shots by Raina
Raina consolidating the middle overs, CSK reached 100 in the 11th over. With Raina getting out for 55, Hussey going for well played 88 and Jadeja getting out in the next ball, CSK once again went into the danger zone. However
MSD's cameo fireworks and
Dwayne Bravo's last over heroics helped CSK win the match with a ball to spare.
Hussey was awarded
MoM for his match-winning 88 runs off 51 balls.
Match VIII: The 34th match of IPL6 witnessed
SRH batting first and posting a modest total of 159 with the help of
Shikhar Dhawan's well paced 63 and Aashish Reddy's late surge 36. In response,
CSK's top order responded well with all contributing and Dhoni going berserk in the final overs. Karan Sharma's maiden in the final overs gave the much needed pressure but Dhoni emphatically pulled the match easily. From 0 off 6 balls, he surged to 67 off 37 balls thus winning the MoM unanimously.
Match IX: In the reminiscent of the last year finals, Current Champions
Kolkata Knight Riders faced current runners up
CSK in the Chepauk Stadium for the 38th match of IPL 6. Batting first CSK once again showed its batting strength with Hussey and Newcomer Saha smashing 100 in the 10th over. With heavy top order hitting from Saha, Raina and Hussey, CSK reached 200. KKR's innings featured some glimpse of last year finals with Bisla going hammer and tonks at the CSK Bowlers'. With some intelligent and tight bowling from Morris and Bravo's 19th and 20th over, CSK won the game convincingly. Hussey's master class 95 with an astonishing strike rate of 161 earned him the MoM once again.
Match log ==References==