Sanju Samson thanked the curator for providing a flat pitch at Chepauk for the game against Delhi Capitals (DC). It meant he didn’t have to do anything extra. He’d got 98 runs and batted to the 18th over before he had any occasion to go ‘hmm, maybe I could’ve…’ Running through for a single after digging out a yorker from T Natarajan, his first thought once he was safely in was to practice a reverse scoop over short third.
By this time, Chepauk was in a proper state. A weekend game had brought 31,244 people to the ground and they were all waiting for the magic moment. Virtually all of them had Samson’s name on their lips. Enough of them are willing to put it on their backs as well. They were all desperate to see him move off 98 and into the 100s. When he did, the decibel warnings were back. When he played the scoop that he had just practiced and sent it for four to end the 18th over, a fanbase that has had to look to the past to sustain themselves could finally dream of the future.
Samson is bound to be the face of Chennai Super Kings (CSK) going forward, even if he might not be captain. He endeared himself even further with his century celebration which was straight out of a Rajinikanth movie. That swishy little salute, which he dedicated to head coach Stephen Fleming, is from Padaiyappa.
He came into the game against DC on the back of three single-digit scores: 6, 7 and 9. He admitted a run like that is enough for doubts to start creeping in. This slump also coincided with the rise of others in his position.
Opening batters set a benchmark in IPL 2024 when their strike rate rose from 141.52 in the previous year to 154.67. That was when Travishek was born and the world woke up to the fact you could construct a T20 innings thinking solely about boundaries. IPL 2025 improved on that (156.51). IPL 2026 has taken it out of sight (170.85) though it is from a sample size of just 18 matches at the moment.
It is enough to make most people second guess themselves. CSK, for better or worse, don’t. They never go looking for things when things are good and are even less keen to do so when things are bad. It is why Samson didn’t make any changes to his pre-match routine and why he played exactly like he would if he had been in form. It is also why Ruturaj Gaikwad batted as he did. He wanted to keep his shape. He wanted to trust his timing. Most of all, he wanted something to go his way. He thought he had it when he nailed a cover drive in the third over but he couldn’t hit the gap. At that point, CSK’s captain was 3 off 8 on Saturday and 44 off 44 for the season. The way he threw his head back and gritted his teeth suggested he was at least somewhat aware of those numbers.
Top-order batters have made the search for boundaries non-negotiable. They walk out knowing nine of the 11 men who could stop them from scoring cannot set foot outside the 30-yard circle until the ball is bowled. Those are odds the house would envy and the house is spoiled. It always wins. Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, Priyansh Arya and Prabhsimran Singh were all screaming “winner, winner, chicken dinner” earlier in the day, putting on 103 for 0 and 93 for 0 against each other in the powerplay. They were boshing from both ends.
In Chennai, one player was keeping up with the times – even he didn’t look to hit any sixes until the 11th over of the innings – and one was lagging behind. Gaikwad’s strike rate off the first 15 balls he has faced in IPL 2026 is 104.54. It is the lowest among the 20 players who have opened the batting at least twice.
“Probably for 25 years, his game and his focus has been so narrow on bulk runs,” Aaron Finch, who won a T20 World Cup opening the batting for Australia, said on ESPNcricinfo’s TimeOut. “Runs, runs, runs. You have to change your mindset to impact. What is the biggest impact I can have on this game and how can I impact this game in the best possible way as quick as I can. The kids who have grown up playing T20 cricket from their introduction to cricket, they’ve got the ability to say, you know what, whatever happens, happens, I’m just going to take them on whereas the other guys, they’ve just been ingrained and they’ve been told every day, get hundreds, get hundreds, get hundreds. That’s purely a mindset thing.”
Samson covered for his batting partner, scoring 45 off 19 balls in the powerplay. But the coolest thing about his innings was the middle-overs mastery. He came into that phase with a strike rate of 236.84. He carried through with a strike rate of 185.16. The field spreading out didn’t really slow him down. It might even have made his best shot of the match look all the more impressive, picking Kuldeep Yadav’s googly, going deep in his crease and flat-batting it over extra cover for six. Samson had already shown everyone his off-side swag at the T20 World Cup. He was the only batter with a strike rate of 200 in that region. On Saturday, he upped it to 246.42.
In an IPL defined by opening batting, the importance of Samson and Gaikwad performing well cannot be overstated, especially for a team whose success relies on posting above-par totals against every single opponent and in all kinds of conditions. Their bowlers just need that cushion. They suffer without it. Fortunately, one half has begun to work. The other is still in progress.
