Picture Credit: Twitter/IPL
Chennai Super Kings have officially become the first team to qualify for the play-offs in IPL 2021 and they have done it in style on Thursday. Chasing a target of 135 runs, the Yellow Army completed the job quite comfortably with Faf du Plessis and Ruturaj Gaikwad putting another impressive opening stand to take their side over the line.
It was another disappointing show from Kane Williamson's side who struggled once again with the bat. After the early dismissal of Jason Roy, SRH just couldn't recover and could only manage to post a total of 134/7 in 20 overs. Josh Hazlewood (3/24) and DJ Bravo (2/17) were the star performers with ball, setting up a perfect platform for the batters.
In reply, the CSK batters did have a moment of worry when they lost few quick wickets but Gaikwad (45 off 38) and du Plessis (41 off 36) had done enough damage to power the Yellow Army to their 9th win of the season, confirming their spot in the play-offs.
MS Dhoni hits a match-winning six after long time
While there were a lot of valuable contributions by CSK players during the match, the star of the show was their skipper MS Dhoni who played a little cameo of 14 runs from 11 deliveries. Although he did struggle in the middle, he unleashed his magic towards the end as he smashed a huge 96m six to seal the win, something that fans have been waiting for quite a long time.
Fans flooded social media with memes and posts around the same as they celebrated CSK's qualification for the play-off stage. On the other hand, some users also did not miss the opportunity to troll Sunrisers Hyderabad who suffered their 9th loss of the season.