IPL 2019: Collective effort reason behind CSK's title triumph last season, says Sam Billings

Chennai Super Kings’ English recruit Sam Billings believes the collective effort was the reason behind the team’s stunning title-winning campaign last year. Not many had given the Super Kings even a chance of going far in the competition let alone winning the title last year when they returned to the league after serving a two-year suspension. Moreover, a majority of their players were above 30.

But in the end, the Super Kings went on to show why they are being one of the most feared and successful teams in the history of the league. Led by the charismatic MS Dhoni, the Super Kings blew away almost every team that came on its way to the title. The likes of Shane Watson, Ambati Rayudu, Suresh Raina, Imran Tahir, and others once again defied the age-related talks and played a crucial role in the title triumph, making the Super Kings just the second team to win the IPL title thrice.

And as the Super Kings get ready to defend their title and become the first team to win the IPL trophy four times, Billings has hailed the last year’s team effort. While he admitted that there were some players who stood out due to their personal brilliance, the success of the team was largely down to the collective effort.

“What stood out for me was that ours was a collective effort,” Billings, who made his debut for CSK last season, was quoted as saying by the club’s official website. Of course, there were a couple of standout performances like (Ambati) Rayudu’s consistency and (Shane) Watson’s brilliance.

Although, actually, if you look at the different games that we won, it was different players at different times stepping up,” he added. “It was phenomenal how much of a team effort it was. Hopefully, more of the same this year.”

Billings in awe of Dhoni:

The England star went on to lavish praise on his skipper Dhoni, saying that the veteran’s clarity of thought the whole time is astonishing. “His clarity of thought the whole time is astonishing, knowing what you need to do at that very moment and not get ahead of yourself. It feeds off to other players,” he said.

The Super Kings will start their title defence against the Virat Kohli-captained Royal Challengers Bangalore on March 23 at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai.

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