Former South African all-rounder Albie Morkel, who spent six seasons for Chennai Super Kings (CSK), has recently opened up the reasons why CSK have achieved huge success.
Albie Morkel, the elder brother of former Proteas pacer Morne Morkel, was a great all-rounder in limited-overs cricket. While the elder Morkel participated in the Indian Premier League (IPL) for nine successive seasons (2008-2016), his best time was for CSK where he spent from 2008 to 2013. During his tenure, CSK won two IPL trophies (2010 and 2011) and one Champions League T20 trophy (2010).
Morkel played 92 T20s for CSK where the right-arm pacer took 91 wickets, and the aggressive left-handed batsman scored 909 runs (average 23.30) with a strike-rate of 142.25.
Apart from winning now-defunct Champions League T20 tournaments for twice (2010 and 2014), CSK is the best consistent side in the IPL history. While they have won three IPL trophies, the second most successful team in this tournament history, they have never finished below the top four. In fact, excluding two seasons along with the two-year suspension period, CSK are the common team in the every IPL finals.
Albie Morkel has credited the captain, MS Dhoni, for CSK’s massive success in T20 cricket. Morkel called him one of the best limited-overs players in the cricket world. Morkel believes that Dhoni knows very well how to bring out the best from his players.
The former CSK all-rounder told a sports magazine, “He (Dhoni) plays a big role. We all know how big Dhoni is in India. He is one of the best T20 and white-ball players ever to play the game; and if you get him as a leader, it is going to bring success as he knows how to get the best out of his players.”
Consistency is their secret: Albie Morkel about the success of CSK
CSK is known as one of the teams who always put strong faith in their core players. That’s why MS Dhoni, Suresh Raina, Dwayne Bravo etc. have mostly served for this IPL franchise. Albie Morkel didn’t forget to mention this crucial point.
He added, “It all comes from keeping your core group of players together for a long time and have the same captain, Dhoni, for all seasons except for the two years when they weren’t part of the competition.
“Consistency is their secret. Over the last few seasons, they have made the finals eight times out of 10.”
IPL 2020 was initially scheduled to begin on 29th March 2020. But due to the novel coronavirus outbreak, the beginning of this tournament has been postponed till mid-April. Observing the situation, the future of IPL 2020 is under the dark cloud.