Chennai Super Kings (CSK) will be playing their second game of IPL 2023 on Monday (April 3) against Lucknow Super Giants. Notably, they will also be returning to their home ground MA Chidambaram Stadium, famously known as Chepauk, in Chennai after a long gap. Perhaps, the four-time champions have not played much at the venue since returning from their two-year ban. On Monday, CSK will be taking the field at the Chepauk for the first time since May 7, 2019.
A whopping 1426 days passed since they played here and the homecoming certainly will be emotional especially for their talisman MS Dhoni who retired from international cricket during this period. But he was waiting to play in front of the Chennai crowd before calling time on his career in IPL as well. Dhoni fever has already swept the entire Chennai and the fans will be hoping that it was worth the wait.
One has to feel for Chennai fans who have been bereft of most of the CSK matches since the 2015 season. The team was banned in 2016 and 2017 and when they finally returned, a sensitive issue was burning in the city and CSK could only play a single match before their home venue was shifted to Pune for the rest of the season.
They played eight matches in IPL 2019 including the first qualifier against Mumbai Indians. But then who must have even thought the beloved team of Chennai will not be returning to Chepauk for more than three years? Yes, CSK have not played in Chennai since then and even though a few matches of IPL 2021 season took place there, no CSK matches were scheduled in order to negate the home advantage.
Nevertheless, the side, led by MS Dhoni, will take the centrestage on Monday and it goes without saying that the stadium will be painted in yellow in support of the home team. LSG, led by KL Rahul, will also have the task to silent the crowd and given CSK's exceptional record at home, it is an extremely tough job.
