Former Indian opener Virender Sehwag questioned Chennai Super Kings’ batting after the five-time champions were knocked out of IPL 2026. CSK suffered a huge loss of 89 runs against Gujarat Titans at the Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad, on Thursday.

Sehwag highlighted that CSK batters were inconsistent throughout the season, leading to their downfall. The likes of Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shivam Dube, and Dewald Brevis could not perform as per the expectations and thus, they could not come up with a collective effort.

CSK looked dependent on Sanju Samson at the top of the order, whereas Kartik Sharma did a decent job in the middle order. 

“I think the biggest problem has been their batting. Sure, there were injury concerns, but the batting was never consistent. If your batting is in form, you can still bear a couple of injuries, but you are not able to chase over 180-190, and then get bowled out for 160-70 while batting first, then that is a concern. If you look at their batting, Brevis did not score any runs at all, they used several players at No.3 and No.4, but no one made a consistent difference,” Virender Sehwag said on Cricbuzz.

On the other hand, former Indian fast bowler Mohit Sharma said CSK and MI could not bring their best to the table despite having the big names in their squad.

“You have to play cricket on the ground, cricket is not played with just names. How well you execute your plans, and handle the situation on the ground matters more. If you look at just names, then MI’s team is massive, the team looked so strong that they would be one-sided winners, but after that you saw how their tournament ended,” he said on Cricbuzz.

“Just like CSK’s batting, their bowling also did not click as a unit in the tournament. If one bowler is having a good day, then two others aren’t. So that is the way things have gone,” he added.

CSK and MI would look to make a strong comeback in the next season.