MS Dhoni, after Chennai Super Kings’ [ CSK ] seven-run loss against Sunrisers Hyderabad [ SRH ] in IPL 2020, gave a peculiar reason for the multiple pauses in play during the last two overs of their chase.

Dhoni walked in to bat immediately after the powerplay with CSK down to 36-3, needing 129 runs from 84 deliveries. Though he remained unbeaten until the last over, scoring 47 runs off 36, he failed to take his side across the line.

Dhoni was in visible discomfort during the penultimate over of the chase and the physio was called upon to take a look at the CSK captain. He then stopped play during the last over as well for a change in bats.

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After the match, he revealed that his throat was getting dry, resulting in a cough, which forced him to stop play. “I’m alright, the throat starts to get dry in these sort of conditions and you start to cough,” he said during the post-match presentation. “When you have legal signs, you can take some time off.”

Dhoni also pointed out that he was “trying to hit the ball too hard” resulting in a lot of mishits. “I was not able to middle a lot of deliveries, maybe trying to hit the ball too hard,” he said.

Dhoni: "I was not able to middle a lot of deliveries, maybe trying to hit the ball too hard. Looking at the outfield, it was happening subconsciously."#CSKvSRH | #IPL2020 pic.twitter.com/K8735sXfQ4

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“Long time back, we may or may not have lost three in a row. We have to get a lot of things right. It’s the professionalism – dropping catches, bowling no-balls. We’re making the same mistakes again. After the 16th over, we had two bad overs. Overall we could have been slightly better.

“Nobody wants to drop catches, but at this level you have to draw a line that these catches have to be taken. Catches like these can really hamper your knockout stage games. What if this was a knockout game? There are plenty of positives in this game. A few areas to improve and we’ll come back stronger.”