CSK kept their winning streak at home intact as they beat KKR by seven wickets. With the win, CSK go on top of the points table as they have now won five of their six games with the only loss coming against Mumbai Indians at Wankhede Stadium.
Here are the three takeaways from the game:
KKR's poor powerplay display
KKR, coming into the game after a big win against RR, were expected to fire from the start. However, they lost their openers and heroes from the previous match -- Chris Lynn and Sunil Narine -- very early.
Robin Uthappa and Nitish Rana too were dismissed inside the powerplay overs and the team could manage only 29 runs in the first six overs.
After being put into bat first, the key was to get a good start on a surface where the ball was gripping. However, KKR failed to read the pitch and kept losing wickets at regular intervals.
And it needed an unbeaten 50 from Andre Russell to propel them to an under-par 108/9 in 20 overs. Russell hit five fours and three sixes in his 44-ball innings.
Other than Russell, only Dinesh Karthik and Robin Uthappa got to double figures scoring 19 and 11 respectively.
It was KKR's worst batting display so far in the tournament.
MS Dhoni's smart plan
First, Dhoni won the toss and asked KKR to bat keeping the dew factor in mind. His bowlers responded from the first over itself as medium pacer Deepak Chahar had Lynn trapped LBW for a five-ball duck.
Veteran spinner Harbhajan Singh got the dangerous Sunil Narine in the very next over before Deepak claimed more two wickets in the powerplay to put KKR on the backfoot.
With their disciplined bowling, CSK restricted the run-flow of KKR batsmen and wickets being fell at regular interval kept adding to KKR's misery.
The spinners did really well on the slow Chepauk surface as Imran Tahir, Harbhajan Singh and Ravindra Jadeja finished with figures of 2/21, 2/15 and 1/17 respectively.
Deepak Chahar (3/20) was the pick of CSK bowlers with the other paceman Scott Kuggeleijn being the most expensive of the lot. (0/34 from 4 overs)
CSK yet again choked the opposition at their fortress in Chennai.
Slow and steady wins the race
CSK playing at home, grasped the conditions well and opener Shane Watson came out blazing from the start. He scored 17 off nine deliveries that included two sixes and a four.
Watson was Sunil Narine's first victim before the Caribbean spinner dismissed Suresh Raina (14) as well.
Watson's opening partner Faf du Plessis, who had scored a fifty in the previous game, steadied the boat with his patient innings stitching a 46 runs partnership with Ambati Rayudu for the third wicket. He top-scored for the winners with a 45-ball 43 that included just three boundaries and finished off the game with Kedar Jadhav.
CSK were home with 16 balls to spare and with the kind of form they are in, no team can stop them from going into the playoffs. They need to win just three more games from eight of their remaining matches.