The way we started the tournament was good. But something happened in the 16th match of IPL 3, CSK vs KXIP which left us heartbroken. We knew later that there were 3 more to follow. Damn, everyone thought that CSK would be out of the tournament and I had no face to see my colleagues in office. It would be a shame if we exit the tournament without a good fight. Then after lot of mixups in the batting and bowling, a new team emerged. It was uncomparably strong in fielding unlike any other teams. I would say that made other teams terrified of us and lead us to victory.
However the way we got into semis makes me nervous even now. The points table, Net run rate..oh mate, all these statistics would have made every CSK fan go crazy until we were sure that our place in semis was secured. I doubted if we would have to face Mumbai Indians in semis. Though it was a strong team, I still beleived we could win them. Anyways luckily we had to lock our horns with the neighbor again.
The raging Deccan Chargers were all set to defeat us. I was always afraid DC could do 'it'. Not sure how this thought came into my mind. I was always scared about the matches against them. To add to my belief, we lost 2 matches against them. So I was really worried about semi-finals against DC. But one of my friend told me CSK would win. His theory was good. Any team has 30% chance to win against its opponent and so CSK having lost 2 matches against DC, can surely will semis. Damn, he was right. CSK won the semis and bang it went to the finals. But Mumbai Indians were waiting there for us already. If the theory could prove itself again, I was not sure if MI gets 30% and would it be CSK?
IPL 3 finals would stay in our hearts forever. Lot of blunders in the match. Missing catch of Suresh Raina (twice) is the costliest mistake any cricketer would do in a T-20 cricket. He proved it tonight. MI started the bowling attack with Spinners just like we did it in semis. Hayden wasted the balls and scored very less runs. It was like he is shouting to the world "Hey guys, I am out of form. Don't expect much from me. You pay, but I may not play". CSK supporters were grinning against his out-of-form batting all through the tournament. How come an Orange cap winner can suddenly go out of form? Leaving the question behind the strong batting line had always let us put good score on the board.
Vijay, Badri, Albie were scoring runs every now and then. Raina was a consistent player of all 3 IPL tournaments. He is the only player to have aggregate of more than 400 runs in all IPL tournaments. So no words to describe his batting power. But his fielding is marvellous. It's long since I have seen such performance. Kaif used to field good like this. Next batsmen Dhoni is kind of responsible player. Had almost 100.00 strike rate in all matches. Whether he plays orthodox or shabby unorthodox shots, it doesn't matter. All that matters were the runs on the board.
A very funny yet an awkward situation to all CSK fans is to pray for the Legend to fail. We all know whole India supports Sachin. But when it came to today's match, CSK fans were shouting for Sachin's wicket. Pretty awkward huh? So our prayers came true and he was gone. Meanwhile Abishek Nayar fell down after surviving many dramatic run out attempts. When all appeared to fall in line, Pollard came into picture and gave us a big shock. I din't like the attitude when he got his team mate AT Rayudu run out. Pollard could have come back and saved the wicket. Instead he did wanted the strike and gave up his team mate's wicket for it. It was damn cruel. It was not like only Pollard can hit big runs. Rayudu coukd have also hit a few sixes. However Pollard din't last long after his mistake. His deeds were served.
I just feel we could have taken the last wicket as well. MI were never all out in this IPL season. It could have been a record for us. It's ok. I can live with that. 2 people to be remembered at this time are the bowling coach Venkatesh Prasad and the fielding coach Stephen Fleming. Great job guys. It was a terrific moment of success when our team lifted the trophy. But the most precious moments were when the Legendary Sachin said "My congratulations to Chennai. They played better than us and they deserved this win". That's what I call a true sportmanship. Hats off to Sachin and hats off to our cool captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni. I guess he would be called as Mahendra 'Singam' Dhoni by Chennai fans from now on.
