IPL 2023 | What explains Chennai Super Kings' presence in 10 out of 16 Indian Premier League finals?

When the teams were auctioned, India Cements acquired the Chennai franchise for USD 91 million. That made them the fourth-most expensive side, after – in that order – the teams from Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Hyderabad.

While all eight teams had the money and vision, what set Chennai apart was their owners’ experience of handling cricket teams. Not only did India Cements have their own office side, but they also owned several clubs in Chennai’s very competitive cricket circuit.

“They were already in the business of running cricket teams. CSK was just the most high-profile team that they ran,” Rahul Dravid explained to Freddie Wilde and Tim Wigmore, the authors of Cricket 2.0.

Perhaps it was the sporting background that gave Chennai an edge over other teams at the first ever players’ auction, in 2008.

MS Dhoni vs icons

Ahead of the auction, six of the eight franchises – Chennai and Rajasthan Royals were exceptions – were assigned local superstars as ‘icon players’ to make the teams relatable to the local fanbases. These cricketers would earn 15 percent more than the most expensive cricketers acquired by the respective teams. Of the icons, Sourav Ganguly retired from international cricket the same year. Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, V.V.S. Laxman (who turned down the offer to become an icon cricketer), and Virender Sehwag would be gone by 2013. At the auction, Rajasthan acquired Shane Warne, who had left international cricket over a year ago. In other words, six of the eight franchises had at least one expensive cricketer who was not expected to be around in five years’ time.

Chennai did not have this baggage. They chose M.S. Dhoni, just over three years into international cricket. Yuvraj Singh, icon player of the Kings XI Punjab, was the same age, but Dhoni had been chosen over Yuvraj as Indian captain for the T20 World Cup. Over time, Yuvraj was sacked as Punjab captain.

Without an ageing superstar thrust upon them as icon cricketer, Chennai found themselves free to invest in the only long-term captaincy candidate. It was not just any captain, either: Dhoni had led India to title glory in the only global tournament in the same format mere months before the auction. Chennai invested $1.5 million in Dhoni, but it was an investment that still pays them dividends. None of the other first-eight IPL captains were leading after 2013: Dhoni is still at the helm a decade after that.

It was not merely a cricketing decision. Until Dhoni, Chennai had famous cricketers – C.P. Johnstone, A.G. Ram Singh, V.V. Kumar, S. Venkataraghavan, Kris Srikkanth, W.V. Raman, Robin Singh, S. Ramesh – but none of them was a global superstar. Dhoni became the face of Chennai cricket. He still is.

Investing in talent

The captaincy sorted, Chennai set out to buy the others. Their next expensive cricketers, Jacob Oram and Albie Morkel, came at USD 675,000 (well below half of Dhoni’s price); Suresh Raina cost USD 650,000; and Muttiah Muralitharan USD 600,000. These were their only investments over USD 400,000. At the same auction, several franchises chased big names from international cricket, ignoring the fact that seven of the starting XI needed to be Indians.

Raina was one of Chennai’s long-term investments, along with locals L. Balaji, S. Badrinath, and R. Ashwin; and other Indians like Parthiv Patel, Sudeep Tyagi, Shadab Jakati, Joginder Sharma, and Manpreet Gony.

They went on to back all of them. Over time, they signed up emerging stars like Ravindra Jadeja, forming an Indian core matched by few franchises in IPL history.

At this point, Rajasthan were perhaps the only franchise to understand the importance of investing long-time in Indian cricketers instead of splurging on overseas superstars. “You just can’t rely on the big-name players to win you a competition like the IPL. It’s just too long and intense,” Morkel, one of Chennai’s early heroes, told the Cricket Monthly.

Chennai did get their overseas stars, of course, but when they did, they backed them and did not chop and change frequently: Muralitharan, Michael Hussey, Dwayne Bravo, Faf du Plessis, Shane Watson, Imran Tahir all got long runs at the franchise.

It was no surprise that Rajasthan and Chennai clashed in the first-ever final. If the other teams figured out where they had gone wrong, they could do little about it, for there were not as many free Indian cricketers available at the auction in 2009.

Over time, Chennai would develop their strategies around the slow, low Chepauk surface, and backing experience over fitness, with considerable success.

But all that happened after they had established themselves as the first IPL side that shone season after season. Of teams to have played more than two seasons, their win-loss ratio of 1.42 (130 wins, 91 defeats) is still the best. Only Mumbai (1.31) comes close.

Though Chennai have reached the final more often, Mumbai’s five titles in 15 seasons are comparable to Chennai’s four in 13. Mumbai’s success began late, but was built around the same principles.

They backed a young leader (Rohit Sharma), invested in Indian talent (Jasprit Bumrah, Hardik and Krunal Pandya, Ishan Kishan, and Suryakumar Yadav to Tilak Varma, Kumar Kartikeya, Nehal Wadhera, and Akash Madhwal), and backed the core to the hilt until they had to release them ahead of the mega auctions.

It is all logical.