Clinical Chennai rip apart Central Stags by CricketArchive Staff Reporter

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Ground:	Kingsmead, Durban
Scorecard:	Middlesex v Derbyshire
Player:	S Badrinath, A Srikkanth, JA Morkel
Event:	Champions League 2010/11

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DateLine: 11th September 2010

 

Chennai Super kings staged a brilliant fight back as they crushed Central Stags by 57 runs. It was brilliant performance by the IPL 2010 champions as at one stage they never looked like crossing the 100 run mark. But in the end Central Stags were not good for their opponents.

 

With batting the strength of the side, Dhoni elected to bat first after winning the toss. But what unfolded for about the next half an hour or so put the Indian side on the backfoot. Hayden's poor run in the Chennai's outfit continued as he was dismissed for a duck. Rain's woes with the short-pitched stuff continued as he was squared up by an unplayable bouncer from Milne and was caught at the slips. Murali Vijay for most part of his stay struggled to get the ball off the square before another short ball consumed him. At 40 for 3 in 8.1 overs things looked quite bleak for the Indian side before Badrinath and Anirudh Srikkanth repaired the innings.

 

Both the batsmen were dropped by the Kiwi fielders and they made full use of those chances. Runs began to come in at a steady pace and then in a much quicker pace as both the batsmen cut loose. The bowlers who put a straitjacket on the Chennai batsmen began to suffer as Badrinath and Srikkanth added 73 runs in 8.1 overs. Once Srikkanth was dismissed Albie Morkel used the long handle effectively to get Chennai past the 150 run mark.

 

Centrals Stags in reply failed to get off to a good start as the Chennai bowlers made full use of the conditions. Bollinger troubled the openers with his pace and swing while Morkel generated enough swing to keep the batsmen quiet. Ingram was caught at point while Worker played an injudicious pull shot. Ashwin was brought inside the powerplay and was greeted with a huge six over long on by Sinclair. The off-spinner then breached the porous defence of Central Stags' skipper Jamie How to reduce the Kiwi side to 35 for 3.

 

Muralitharan was introduced in the eight over and the magical off-spinner soon stamped his presence in the tournament with two wickets in his very first over as Central Stags slipped to 36 for 5 in 7.5 overs. Doug Bracewell battled hard to give his side some respectability but Central Stags were all out for 94.