Mumbai Indians (MI) and CSK have been the two most successful teams in the IPL for a long period of time. In the 13-year history of the IPL, these two teams have shared 8 titles between them which is a testimony of their dominance in the league.
Today we will talk about the best XI of the retired cricketers of Mumbai Indians(MI) and CSK –
Openers (Sachin Tendulkar and Dwayne Smith)
Sachin Tendulkar was the first captain of Mumbai Indians and was their icon player in the inaugural edition of the tournament in 2008. The master blaster mostly opened the batting for Mumbai and for a brief period, he opened the batting with Dwayne Smith as well.
Dwayne Smith played for both Mumbai and CSK and had a successful record for both the franchises as well. Tendulkar and Smith would complement each other really well because of their drastically different playing style. While Smith was a hard hitter of the ball, Tendulkar was all class.
Middle order (Brendon McCullum, Michael Hussey, Subramaniam Badrinath)
Brendon McCullum didn’t ever keep wickets while he was playing for CSK as MS Dhoni was already there behind the stumps for men in yellow. McCullum played as a specialist batsman for CSK, but in this XI, McCullum would be the designated keeper and would bat at no. 3.
McCullum, who is currently the head coach of KKR, was one of those players who was good against both pace and spin and could bat at any position in the line-up. He could play vertical as well as horizontal bat shots.
Michael Hussey was the most successful overseas batsman for CSK, playing in top as well as in the middle order. Hussey scored a hundred in the first ever game that he played for CSK in the first edition of the IPL.
Subramaniam Badrinath was the floater in the CSK line-up and played a key role in CSK’s back to back title triumphs in 2010 and 2011 respectively. Badrinath often used to bat up the order for CSK and used to bail the team out of trouble whenever they lost early wickets.
All-rounders (Albie Morkel, Rajagopal Sathish)
Albie Morkel was probably the most destructive lower order batsman in the IPL at one stage and he wouldn’t just make a difference with the bat for CSK, he was equally efficient with the ball as well and was often used with the new ball by the CSK skipper MS Dhoni.
Rajagopal Sathish hailed from Tamil Nadu, but he had a very successful couple of seasons for Mumbai Indians. Sathish was a powerful player down the order and was a useful medium pacer who could chip in with a couple of overs in the middle phase of the innings.
Bowlers (Zaheer Khan, Pragyan Ojha, Shadab Jakati, Ashish Nehra)
Zaheer Khan and Ashish Nehra spearheaded the pace bowling attacks of MI and CSK in the latter stages of their respective careers. Nehra’s performance for CSK actually helped him regain his place in the Indian T20I squad as well.
Pragyan Ojha was a part of the title winning squad of Mumbai Indians in 2013 and bowled some crucial overs in the final. The same goes for Shadab Jakati as well who did a similar role for CSK in the final of IPL 2010 where he dismissed the master blaster Sachin Tendulkar.
Both Ojha and Jakati were outstanding left arm spinners who used to bowl tight areas and would hardly give the batsman anything easy to manipulate and milk the bowling.
