IPL 2018: Here Is Why MS Dhoni Might Never Reunite With Chennai Super Kings

Chennai Super Kings, an IPL franchise that dominated the almost every season of the Indian Premier League, faced a 2-year long ban after being named in the spot-fixing scandal, along with Rajasthan Royals, the first ever IPL Champions.

However, both teams are back from their exile period and are looking to make the most of the lost time in the IPL 2018 season. With the auction still being a few months away, there has been a lot of buzz around the retention policy and whether Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals will be able to retain their squads which were picked by Rising Pune Supergiant (RPS) and Gujarat Lions for the previous seasons.

That said, just a couple of hours after CSK came out from the ban, they openly expressed the wish of retaining MS Dhoni as the captain and the former Indian skipper too shared some nostalgic moments via his social media channels.

MS Dhoni was the one who made the Chennai Super Kings brand and for the franchise’s fans, the side could never be the same without MSD, the two-time IPL-winning captain. However, a decade after boarding the Indian Premier League wagon and going with an untested business model, which indeed proved fruitful, the owners of the eight franchises gathered for a meeting to decide how the league will pan out in the next 5 years.

The governing council had some serious decisions to make, including the retention policy, match cards and an increase in purchasing purse for the franchise.

Since all these decisions needed unanimous approvals, sources are saying that not even a single proposal got an approval, meaning that there still is a cloud of uncertainty over the retention policy as well as MS Dhoni’s reunion with Chennai Super Kings.

It was reported that Kolkata Knight Riders, Rajasthan Royals, and Delhi Daredevils haven’t given their approval for the 5-player retention policy, while current Champions Mumbai Indians, Sunrisers Hyderabad, Kings XI Punjab, Chennai Super Kings and Royal Challengers Bangalore, were all in favor of the proposal.

It is a known fact that KKR’s co-owner, Shah Rukh Khan wants to bag MS Dhoni for IPL 2018 season and has openly stated that he will leave no stone unturned to make his dream come true. But would MS Dhoni be the same magician with a different team as his wand?

Considering his RSP days, we can safely assume not and in addition to the MS Dhoni-CSK reunion, fans are also loving the idea of seeing the two-time World Cup-winning captain taking up the responsibility to lead a team once again, something he was deprived of last season with RSP choosing Steve Smith as their captain.

This is how every franchise wants the new rules to shape up for IPL 2018.

• KKR, Kings XI Punjab, and Delhi Daredevils want two match cards instead of the retention policy, which can make them able to swap two players during the IPL 2018 itself, for a lower or higher price.

• On the other hand, Mumbai Indians, Royal Challengers Bangalore, Sunrisers Hyderabad and Chennai Superkings are asking for two match cards, apart from retaining 5 players.

• Rajasthan Royals is the only franchise that wants to start afresh and is not in favor of either of the proposals.

As for the buying purse, it was reported that Indian Premier League’s operations team floated a hike from Rs 66 crore to anywhere between Rs 80 to 85 crore ( 25-30%) in the salary purse per franchise. But there were also those who said that the salary purse should get a gradual hike of Rs 5 crore only.

Coming back to MS Dhoni’s comeback at Chennai Super Kings, with the retention policy still uncertain, all we can hope for is, an unanimous decision in order to see the former skipper try to repeat his glory with CSK.

However, it’s been a decade since we are seeing the same core-squad in the teams and it might be the right time to start afresh. Moreover, if the game-card proposal gets an approval, it might have some adverse repercussion on the IPL 2018 auction as teams will be bid selectively in order to save some cash for the mid-tournament swaps.

All we can do now is wait and see how the IPL governing body come out of this mess and continue the success of this yearly phenomenon called Indian Premier League.