Harbhajan Singh Echoes Matthew Hayden's Sentiments on CSK's MS Dhoni; Bats For Promotion in Batting Order in IPL 2025

IPL 2025: MS Dhoni has for years been facing backlash over his batting position for CSK in the IPL . But on Sunday night, it peaked. The criticism peaked after Chennai Super Kings lost their second game on the trot. Not just fans, even the pundits criticised Dhoni. 

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After former Australian star Matthew Hayden reckoned Dhoni should retire and be in the commentary box, Harbhajan Singh has echoed more or less the same sentiments. Harbhajan admitted that the game was over by the time Dhoni walked in to take strike against Rajasthan. 

"I would like to present some stats. Dhoni sahab bahut bade khiladi hain, par jab who aaye hain, match khatam ho chuka tha. Whenever Dhoni has chased since IPL 2023 in winning causes, he has scored just 3 runs in 9 balls, without a single boundary or six.," Harbhajan said on his YouTube channel. 

Harbhajan also suggested that Dhoni should be batting higher up the order.

‘Send Dhoni up and leave him’

"The team management needs to look at this differently. Send Dhoni up and leave him alone. Tell him to smash, because if he scores runs, then that would matter. Otherwise, there isn't much to nitpick. He still smashes them but these stats aren't materialising," he added.

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RR Defeat CSK In IPL Clash

Rajasthan Royals finally got a win next to their name in the 2024-25 IPL season that too with a win against five time IPL champions. Wanindu Hasaranga did his job with the ball as he dismissed several Chennai Super Kings batters. This included the likes of Rahul Tripathi, Shivam Dube and Vijay Shankar and Ruturaj Gaikwad.

The job by the bat was done by Nitish Rana who scored an aggressive 81 off 36 balls to help RR get a total of 182. CSK failed to reach the target of 183 as the Chennai based franchise have now lost back to back games.