Chennai Super Kings batting coach Michael Hussey has backed the players despite their big loss against Rajasthan Royals in IPL 2026. RR hammered CSK by eight wickets and chased down 128 runs with 47 balls to spare to start their campaign on a high.

CSK’s batting was not up to the mark as the Men in Yellow were bowled out for 127 on a tricky Guwahati pitch. The CSK batters could not show the right application and their shot selection was also not the greatest on Monday.

However, this is just the start of the season and Hussey has no doubts in backing the team to the hilt.

“100%, we’ll still be backing this team. No questions about that. There’s no doubt about that. I’m sure a few guys will say, in hindsight, maybe I could have played a bit differently, but on another day it comes off, and they change the momentum of the game. I don’t want our batsmen moving forward to have clouded thoughts or put doubts in their minds, because I don’t think players perform at their best when they are second-guessing themselves,” Hussey said in the post-match press conference.

“I would prefer them to come in with a clear attitude and a clear plan on how they want to play, assess the conditions quickly, and then back themselves. If it comes off, great. If it doesn’t, that’s sometimes cricket. So I don’t want this performance to cloud or put doubt and fear into our team,” he added.

Reflecting on the conditions, Hussey admitted that CSK could have adapted better to the pitch.

“I think if we had our time again, we may have tried to adjust to the conditions a little bit better. But generally speaking, around the country, the pitches are going to be pretty good for batting. So I’d expect much better batting performances in the future, especially if the pitches are a bit flatter,” he said.

“It’s a good lesson for us. We need to take the learnings from this game that if the conditions aren’t perfect, maybe we need to adjust our approach a little bit and try to score our runs in different areas. We’ll definitely take a few learnings, but as I said, we want to put this one behind us pretty quickly and move on,” he added.

Chennai Super Kings will next take on Punjab Kings at the MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai, on Friday.