Chennai Super Kings (CSK) had a pretty dismal campaign in the recently concluded India Premier League (IPL) 2022 as they were among the bottom two teams in the standings. But despite the nightmarish season, CSK had some positives which they will surely take it to the next season to get back to the winning ways.
The leg-spinner Prashant Solanki is one of the emerging players who had the opportunity to display his skills at the big stage and he also had the opportunity to play alongside the legendary skipper MS Dhoni as he was roped in by the CSK franchise for Rs 1.2 crore in the IPL 2022 mega auction.
Although he didn't get to play in the initial few games but he made his debut in the final phase of the league stage. His top performance came to the fore in the final league game against the Rajasthan Royals.
Expectedly, the youngster learned a lot from Dhoni as he went on to reveal the advice he received. The 40-year-old asked Solanki to keep things simple and try to build pressure on the batters with dot balls.
“Mahi bhai keeps things very simple. Whether you’re bowling leg-spin, googly or top-spin, if you’re not giving runs, you are bowling well. He had given us instructions that we have to bowl dot balls because that’s what creates pressure in T20 cricket,” Solanki said in a chat with Sportskeeda.
“In the second game, I came into bowl a bit late because we didn’t have a big total and he was shuffling the bowlers around. I was hit for a six off my first ball. Then he (Dhoni) gave me an indication that I have to pull my length back and keep it a little shorter. Let him play strokes on the bigger end. Then I was successful.”
“He (Hetmyer) hit me for a boundary and then Mahi bhai indicated to me once again to use the bigger side of the ground. I bowled the top spinner on his legs and he miscued it and was out on deep mid-wicket,” he added.
CSK are likely to retain Solanki for the next season. It will be interesting to see how many wickets the uncapped leg-spinner takes for the Chennai-based franchise. Chepauk might host CSK’s home matches during IPL 2023, which is why Solanki could be one of the main players for CSK.
