Prashant Solanki shared his experience in his debut season for CSK and how MS Dhoni helped him to do well.
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The young leg-spinner, Prashant Solanki was a net bowler for the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in the second half of IPL 2021 and the team management believed he had enough talent to be picked in the main squad as well. And, during the IPL 2022 mega auction, CSK bought him for INR 1.2 crore. However, for any youngster, it is certainly a dream to be bowling with the legend MS Dhoni standing behind the stumps. While the veteran spinners like Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal have been quite vocal about how Dhoni helped them from behind the stumps and it helped them to improve, Prashant Solanki also shared his experience in his debut season for CSK.
Notably, MS Dhoni has constantly motivated him from behind the wickets and gave him some important tips to be successful in T20 cricket as well. While speaking in an exclusive chat with Sportskeeda, Solanki has shared how Dhoni helped him keep his game simple and not get nervous about the big game as well. However, Chennai Super Kings had a rather forgettable season this year where they finished second place in the points table from the bottom. Moreover, they were the second team to be eliminated from the cash-rich league after Mumbai Indians.
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He said: “Mahi bhai keeps things very simple. Whether you’re bowling leg-spin, googly or top-spin, if you’re not giving runs, you are bowling well. He had given us instructions that we have to bowl dot balls because that’s what creates pressure in T20 cricket.”
Although Prashant Solanki went wicketless on his IPL debut, he claimed a couple of wickets against the Rajasthan Royals (RR) that helped his team to give a tough fight till the end as well. RR was doing well at one point where young batter Yashasvi Jaiswal was smashing all over the park. He smashed Solanki for a six and the pressure was on the leg-spinner to bounce back as well. But the youngster has revealed how Dhoni suggested a few tweaks from behind the stumps that helped him to get back and dismissed Jaiswal as his maiden IPL wicket.
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“In the second game, I came in to bowl a bit late because we didn’t have a big total and he was shuffling the bowlers around. I was hit for a six off my first ball. Then he (Dhoni) gave me an indication that I have to pull my length back and keep it a little shorter. Let him play strokes on the bigger end. Then I was successful.” However, MS Dhoni also helped Solanki dismiss the dangerous Shimron Hetmyer. “He (Hetmyer) hit me for a boundary and then Mahi bhai indicated me once again to use the bigger side of the ground. I bowled the top spinner on his legs and he miscued it and was out on deep mid-wicket,” Prashant Solanki concluded.
