Strengths –
The Presence Of Impactful Players – The biggest strength that this team possess is the number of impactful players that they have on their roster. Likes of MS Dhoni, Steve Smith, Faf du PLesis, Ajinkya Rahane and R Ashwin to name a few. The name of these players is enough to weigh this team as the heaviest of all as these have oodles of experience, which is enough to put any opposition under pressure.
Strong Batting Line-Up – The Pune-based franchise has strongest batting line-up, compared to any other team as they have someone like Rahane, Smith and du Plessis, who can bat at the top and down the middle as well. These three are stars of the team who knows when to put their foot on an accelerator in the shortest format of the game. Plus, the presence of MS Dhoni down the order is enough for this team to not care about the death over as Dhoni’s blitz and his ability to churn out as much runs he want versus any bowling line-up adds to the brawn of this team. So batting looks really set at the moment.
Solid Spin – With Ravichandran Ashwin -The home bully; Adam Zampa – the highest wicket-taker in ODIs last year, and Imran Tahir – the number 1 T20I bowler; what more can a team ask for in their spin department? The presence of these three spinners is enough for the captain not to look for any other options as they combine to give captain variety. So these three spinners can be used as an attacking force.
Any team who is sure of services of these three spinners already have half of the game in their bag, especially when they will be playing seven of their games at their home ground in Pune.
Dominant All-Rounders – This team spent a total of 14.50 Crores to acquire the services of all-rounder Ben Stoke and now it’s time to reap benefits out of amount they spent. Ben Stokes will be the main weapon which they will look to cash in on and along with him, Rajat Bhatia and Dan Christian provides them with an extra all-round option. The success of this team heavily depends on Stokes particularly.