Follow UsMS Dhoni was finally seen in his purest form during the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 on April 14 (Monday) against the Lucknow Super Giants in Lucknow (LSG). The Chennai Super Kings (CSK) skipper started the day on a positive note, winning the toss and deciding to field first.
His changes in the playing 11 worked well, as Anshul Kamboj and Khaleel Ahmed worked in tandem to remove two of the most dangerous LSG batters, Aiden Markram and Nicholas Pooran.
Even Ravindra Jadeja, who had been dismal throughout the first six games, took two crucial wickets of Mitchell Marsh and Ayush Badoni. Behind the stumps, Dhoni was equally sharp as he stumped Badoni by disturbing the woodwork in a flash from behind the wicket. The 43-year-old even showed one of his acts of magical realism, something that is hard to believe but actually does happen in reality.
He ran out Abdul Samad by hitting the stumps at the non-striker's end directly from behind the stumps, and the biggest surprise was that he threw the ball underarm.
As if all this was not enough, Dhoni came out to bat in one of the toughest situations. CSK struggled at 111/5, needing 56 to win, and Shivam Dube could not connect his shots.
That’s when Dhoni infused momentum into the game with his boundary hitting, and it was courtesy of the pressure put by him that Dube also hit a four first ball in the 19th over, bowled by Shardul Thakur. The left-hander got lucky and smashed a waist-high full toss from Thakur for a six.
In the end, Dhoni, for his all-round efforts in the game, was named Player of the Match and thereby became the oldest to receive the award at 43 years and 280 days of age.