New Delhi, May 22 (IANS) Coach Stephen Fleming credited his Chennai Super Kings’ success to correct team selection and the loyalty the franchise has shown to the players.
The Super Kings reached an unprecedented fifth final in six Indian Premier League (IPL) editions after a convincing 48-run win over Mumbai Indians Tuesday night.
“We are consistent in selection and have been rewarded with consistency in performance. There are several factors that led to our fifth final in six editions of the tournament,” Fleming told reporters here.
“The selection was correct and quality players were recruited. To add to it, there are other things like maturity, solid performance and good relationship with the franchise.”
Mumbai Indians seemed well on their way to chase down the target of 192 for one with Dwayne Smith smashing 68 off 28 balls. But it all turned sour for Mumbai after the West Indian fell in the ninth over.
“We were a little bit on the backfoot as the bowling came under a bit of pressure from Smith. We needed to quickly turn around things. Bringing in Jadeja was the right move as it turned out to be the Game-Changer,” said the coach.
The former New Zealand captain praised Australian Michael Hussey for a phenomenal year after the left-hander took the lead in the orange cap competition having scored 732 runs in IPL-6 so far.
“It’s been unbelievable. He (Hussey) is also in a little bit of shock as to how good he has been. I used to pull his legs, calling him ‘too old and traditional’ to play some innovative shots. But now that he is concentrating solely on T20s, he is exploring ways to get better. He has been an absolute delight this season,” Fleming said.
Mumbai Indians captain Rohit Sharma was still confident of his team’s chances but said that they needed to bowl with more variety.
“We didn’t bowl with enough variety. But still we are not worried about the bowling, our bowlers just had an off-day,” said the middle-order batsman.
“We lost too many wickets in the middle and that is where the match slipped out of our hands. We have been playing consistent cricket, we just had one bad day,” he added.
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