Albie Morkel confident Chennai can still qualify for playoffs – Cricket News Update
Bowling all-rounder http://www.senore.com/Cricket/JA-Morkel-c1613, who is currently affiliated with the Chennai Super Kings in the ongoing 5th edition of the Indian Premier League, is confident his team can make it to the tournament playoffs, despite needing 4 straight victories
in their remaining 4 matches.
“… We have played great cricket for the last four seasons and this season has probably been the worst. But we are still in the fourth position at the table, which shows that even though we play bad cricket, we still can compete,” the 30-year-old observed.
The Chennai Super Kings have been crowned IPL champions twice before, in 2010 and 2011, and despite having gone into the current tournament as favourites, have been unable to deliver consistently.
The team started the season on a disappointing note, losing to the Mumbai Indians by 8 wickets. The next match turned out in their favour as they managed to secure a 74-run victory over the Deccan Chargers.
However, a pattern of winning and losing began to emerge as the tournament progressed, and the Super Kings followed up nearly every victory with a defeat. Their last four matches include one victory (a 10-run win over the bottom-of-the-table Deccan Chargers
on May 4), and 3 losses (to the Kings XI http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mumbai-c820 Indians).
Despite their average showings, the Super Kings are still at number four on the points table, having won 5 of the 12 matches they have played so far. As the tournament reaches the playoffs stage, the MS Dhoni-led side have four matches left to play, and
will need to win all four in order to qualify for the next stage – a tall order, but Morkel believes his side is capable of taking up the challenge.
“… We need to win four out of four. We have to bounce back and we have to do that because we have four games left and we want to qualify for the semifinals … We have tough back-to-back games but we will be up for it.”
“In the last four games we need to get some momentum going,” he added.
He also went on to indentify the team’s inability to finish matches effectively as one of their weak points, adding that fine-tuning the basics would enable the Super Kings to eventually finish in the top four.
The team will have a chance to play for a place in the semi-finals as they prepare for their next encounter – a meeting with the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Rajasthan-c837 Royals at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium in Jaipur on May 10.
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