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Former India star batter Suresh Raina, who has represented Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in the Indian Premier League (IPL) for a good period of time made a big statement on MS Dhoni's successor ahead of the glitzy league's mini auction which is set to take place in Kochi on Friday (December 23).
Raina feels the four-time champions will break bank to avail the services of Sam Curran in the IPL 2023 auction on Friday. He also made a prediction and said that the star English all-rounder can become CSK's next captain, given the Chennai-based franchise rope him in.
The 24-year-old all-rounder, who missed the action in the IPL 2022, made a cracking comeback in the T20 World Cup to emerge Player of the series riding on his stellar show with the ball and willow, where he snared 13 wickets in six matches including a fifer. He also picked 3/12 in the final against Pakistan to steer England to the title glory.
Curran represented CSK in 2020 and 2021 as he made his IPL debut for Punjab Kings back in 2019. CSK roped Curran for a whopping Rs 5.5 crore but this time around, given the stature of the star English player, franchises are expected to break bank on the overseas all-rounder which can make CSK's bid challenging.
Curran picked up 13 wickets and scored 186 runs, forming a fine bond with the likes of MS Dhoni and Stephen Fleming at CSK in his inaugural season. Curran picked up 9 wickets in as many matches in his second season with Chennai.
"CSK really want him in their set-up because he has done really well in the World Cup. He has got great leadership qualities as well. CSK can look for a captain in him in the future," Raina told Jio Cinema.
Chennai wickets will definitely suit his bowling. A lot of variation and when you are playing home games, he is going to be very useful," Raina added, highlighting that the IPL will return to home and away format in 2023.
With Dhoni in the fag end of his IPL career, it will highly unlikely that he will be continuing beyond 2023. CSK handed over the captaincy to Ravindra Jadeja in IPL 2022 but the all-rounder stepped down, handing back the reigns to Dhoni following a poor start to the season.
Meanwhile, another former CSK batter Robin Uthappa said that the Men in Yellow will be keen on investing on a player like Curran.
"It makes more sense to invest in a player like him and also retain him in the next tw years. He has got the skllset to become a captaincy material," he said.
Bouncing back from a poor Indian Premier League (IPL) season is no easy feat, but if anyone can do it, then it's the MS Dhoni-led CSK. The four-time IPL winners have lifted the coveted title in 2010, 2011, 2018 and 2021. It was a poor tournament for the Chennai-based franchise last time round, where they lost 10 of their 14 matches and finished the tournament second from the bottom.
Ahead of the IPL 2023 Auction, Chennai retained only 14 players in the squad from the previous season. One of the vital cogs in many of their successful campaigns, Dwayne Bravo, announced his retirement earlier in 2022. He will now take up the mantle of bowling coaching in the upcoming season of the IPL.
List of players retained by Chennai Super Kings:
Retained list: MS Dhoni, Ambati Rayudu, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Devon Conway, S Senapati, Ravindra Jadeja, Moeen Ali, Mitchell Santner, Dwaine Pretorius, Shivam Dube, R Hangargekar, Deepak Chahar, Mukesh Choudhary, Maheesh Theekshana, Tushar Deshpande, Simarjeet Singh, Maheesh Pathirana, Prashant Solanki.
List of players released by Chennai Super Kings:
Dwayne Bravo, Robin Uthappa, Adam Milne, Hari Nishaanth, Chris Jordan, Bhagath Varma, KM Asif, Narayan Jagadeesan.
Purse remaining: Rs 20.45 crore
