Mahendra Singh Dhoni Is IPL's Biggest Question Mark Right Now
One of India’s most illustrious white-ball players is the IPL’s biggest question mark right now
July 7 this year is when Mahendra Singh Dhoni turns 44. For 18 of those years, at the helm even when he wasn’t, he’s led Chennai Super Kings to five IPL titles. His legend has slowly shifted from Indian cricket’s Midas to CSK’s own Melquíades.
Glory in sport often arrives early and is shorter-lived than one would like. The late Anthony Bourdain was Dhoni’s age when he first tasted success. Samuel L Jackson shot into popular imagination at 46.
In MSD’s case, however, even ardent fans know that limited-overs legend has overstayed his welcome. A 43-year-old MS Dhoni walking into bat at nine after the phoenix of an unlikely win has been reduced to dust, is difficult to watch. It’s not just embarrassing—it’s plain frustrating to take gulp after gulp of institutional patriarchy. Year after year, Dhoni has shown up for CSK despite constant speculation about the contrary.
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He still looks well-built but his feared ability to whack the white ball has been found missing. He is turning up to bat at number nine even in situations that need him to assert his experience and powerful bottom hand, which some viewers continue to believe might appear magically any given day.
In CSK’s seventh game this season, Dhoni played the kind of quickfire cameo that fans clutch very close to their hearts. His unbeaten 26 off 11 balls was celebrated all over the internet, with the world claiming the finisher was back. But the world shouldn’t have to patronise a cricketer whose business in his heyday was to pummel the best of bowlers into submission.
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One game prior, captain Ruturaj Gaikwad was ruled out of the tournament with an injury, necessitating another sudden appearance for crisis leader Dhoni. The new appointment evidently raised eyebrows, with gossip even suggesting that Gaikwad’s exit didn’t really have to do with an injury. The opener, given the yellow mantle in 2023—another desperate but urgently required attempt on the management’s part to shape the leadership in a new direction with Dhoni watching from behind the stumps—was even said to have unfollowed Dhoni on Instagram. But Gaikwad may have never followed the senior CSK pro in the first place.
The workings of CSK have always been something of a black box. In 2022, Dhoni stepped aside after leading the side for 14 seasons, handing over the reins to Ravindra Jadeja. At 33, the senior India allrounder struggled badly, winning only two of his first eight games. Dhoni was reinstated, Jadeja relieved, with the defending champions still slumping to ninth that year.
It’s a pattern. A leadership experiment begins—Jadeja in 2022, Gaikwad in 2023 (both players crucial to the CSK core but not really captaincy material)—and the moment it falters, Dhoni is back. The franchise keeps hovering around his shadow, unable or unwilling to break free. As of the halfway point this season, the five-time champions sit at the bottom of the table, with just two wins from seven games. And yet the aura of Dhoni remains intact.
But what does one do? Dhoni is CSK’s lucky charm. He’s brought them titles after absolute downer seasons. Under him, they’ve managed to come back from behind. His aura has inspired match-winning performances from awestruck young cricketers eager to please him.
It’s also a culture thing—the Chennai fanbase is known to make gods of CSK alums. Suresh Raina was crowned Chinna Thala. R. Ashwin—who once opened the bowling for Dhoni—was similarly sanctified. The franchise has always been more insular than most, its culture tightly bound around a few beloved figures. The franchise has always been more insular than most, but the wounds of their two-year suspension in 2015–17 have congealed into a prickly cult of sorts.
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Despite a glittering alumni list—Matthew Hayden, Michael Hussey, Dwayne Bravo, Muttiah Muralitharan—CSK has never seriously invested in a leadership model that doesn’t revolve around Dhoni. Both Jadeja and Gaikwad were handed the captaincy as contingency measures, with Dhoni visibly guiding (or guarding) from behind. The reversion each time has been swift. Bafflingly, Faf Du Plessis, arguably one of the world’s best white-ball leaders, was never given a shot.
Recently, Dhoni joked he would play even if the franchise made him show up in a wheelchair. It’s funny, but also telling. CSK seems to believe, irrationally but fervently, in the perpetual relevance of a fading titan—one who’s brought them five titles, three of those in just the last six seasons.
It helps, of course, that Dhoni the cricketer and Dhoni the brand operate in seamless sync. His sports marketing firm, Rhiti Sports, has long had stakes—literal and symbolic—in his continued presence on the field. The longer he wears the CSK yellow, the brighter the aura burns.
The question, increasingly, isn’t whether Dhoni can still deliver in moments. It’s whether CSK can ever evolve beyond the codependency. Can they?
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