Chennai Super Kings (CSK) head coach Stephen Fleming provided a major update on frontline pacer Deepak Chahar’s injury status, saying he warming the sidelines with a ‘minor’ niggle and will be back in action soon. The five-time IPL champions will take on Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) in the 34th match of the Indian Premier League at the Ekana Cricket Stadium on Friday. Speaking at the pre-match press conference, Fleming, a former Kiwi all-format skipper, said Chahar was well and truly on the recovery road and presently going through his rehabilitation phase.
The head coach, for good measure, reminded the media persons that 32-year-old bowling all-rounder Shardul Thakur, who came in as a like-for-like replacement for Chhahar in Chennai’s previous match against the Mumbai Indians (MI), fared well.
“He is doing his rehabs well. It was a minor injury nothing to worry about. Shardul Thakur bowled well in the last match against Mumbai so we opted to give time to Chahar to recover well,” said Fleming on Chahar at the pre-match press conference.
Earlier, on Sunday, Thakur, replacing Chahar in the playing eleven, failed to pick up wickets but did manage to put a leash on the scoring rate, conceding just 35 runs in his full quota of four overs.
CSK will go into Friday’s game on the back of a victory over the Mumbai Indians (MI) by 20 runs. Led by Ruturaj Gaikwad, the Chennai franchise currently stands third in the IPL 2024 standings with 8 points, with 4 wins out of 6 games.
Chennai Super Kings Squad: Rachin Ravindra, Ruturaj Gaikwad (C), Ajinkya Rahane, Daryl Mitchell, Shivam Dube, Ravindra Jadeja, Sameer Rizvi, MS Dhoni (Wk), Shardul Thakur, Tushar Deshpande, Mustafizur Rahman, Matheesha Pathirana, Nishant Sindhu, Moeen Ali, Mitchell Santner, Shaik Rasheed, Aravelly Avanish, Maheesh Theekshana, RS Hangargekar, Simarjeet Singh, Mukesh Choudhary, Prashant Solanki, Ajay Jadav Mandal, Richard Gleeson, Deepak Chahar.
Lucknow Super Giants Squad: Quinton de Kock, KL Rahul (Wk/C), Deepak Hooda, Ayush Badoni, Marcus Stoinis, Nicholas Pooran, Krunal Pandya, Ravi Bishnoi, Mohsin Khan, Shamar Joseph, Yash Thakur, Manimaran Siddharth, Prerak Mankad, Arshad Khan, Krishnappa Gowtham, Amit Mishra, Kyle Mayers, Ashton Turner, Matt Henry, Naveen-ul-Haq, Devdutt Padikkal, Yudhvir Singh Charak, Mayank Yadav, Arshin Kulkarni.
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