Kapil Dev doubts MS Dhoni, says ‘impossible for him to perform if he plays only IPL’
Kapil Dev says that it would be impossible for Dhoni to perform well if he continues to play just the IPL. Dev backed his words by mentioning Chennai Super Kings (CSK) performance this year. Dhoni had announced his retirement from international cricket in August this year.
FollowFormer Indian player Kapil Dev made an unpleasant remark on MS Dhoni, as he said that it would be ‘impossible’ for the latter to perform if he only features in the Indian Premier League (IPL) each year.
MS Dhoni, who last featured in in the 2019 World Cup semi-final against New Zealand in Manchester, hit the cricket ground after a sabbatical of more than a year. He had an average sort of IPL season for Chennai Super Kings (CSK), there they failed to make it to the playoffs for the first time under his captaincy.
Dhoni, who retired from international cricket on August 15, confirmed his presence for the next IPL season during the toss time in Abu Dhabi, when CSK clashed against KXIP. On being asked about this being the last match for him in ‘yellow’ by Danny Morris, Dhoni reiterated ‘Definitely not.’
Following Dhoni’s plan to continue cricket only by playing IPL, Kapil Dev said to ABP News, “If Dhoni decides on playing only IPL every year, then it’s impossible for him to perform. It’s not a good thing to talk about age but at his age (39 years), the more he plays, the more his body will be tuned.”
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“If you don’t play any cricket for 10 months a year and suddenly play IPL, you can see what happened. You can always have a season up or down if you have played so much cricket. It has happened to someone like Chris Gayle also,” Kapil Dev stated.
“He should go back to First-Class cricket (domestic List-A and T20) and play there. If someone has achieved so much, the dip in form does affect and it becomes a challenge. Let’s see how he comes out of it,” he added.
Kapil Dev’s words somewhat stood true this IPL season too, where CSK were eliminated early, and Dhoni could score only 200 runs in the 14 matches, without even scoring a fifty.
