During the play-off match against Gujarat Titans (GT), the defending champions, captain MS Dhoni of Chennai Super Kings (CSK) was involved in a contentious incident involving the umpires. Social media had mixed reactions to the incident, and Brad Hogg, a former Australian spinner, joined in.

However, he was one of those who advised the officials to exercise greater control over the game and was not particularly impressed with the umpires.

“Dhoni used his presence to full effect, luring the umpires into a 4 minute discussion causing time to run out for Pathirana to bowl after an extended break off the field. Umpires laughing over the incident rather than taking control of the situation is not good enough,” he tweeted.

The occurrence occurred just before the fifteenth over of the Gujarat run chase. Just before the over, Dhoni was seen taking part in a vivified discussion with the umpires with a portion of his colleagues likewise surrounding the authorities. The CSK skipper wanted to use his death-over specialist Matheesha Pathirana rather than tossing the ball to someone else, which was later suggested to be a deliberate time-wasting tactic. At first, it was unclear what the problem was.

However, Pathirana was ineligible to bowl in accordance with the rules because he had just entered the field after being absent from the dugout for a considerable amount of time. Yet again the conversation saw the match stop for more than four minutes, following which Pathirana was qualified to move his arms.

Pathirana finished his quota of overs with 2/37, and Dhoni scored 15 runs to lead CSK to their 10th IPL final in 14 seasons.

In light of Ruturaj Gaikwad’s half-century, CSK set GT a run target of 173. GT responded by losing everything for 157 with the final ball of their innings.

Hogg as well as Indian cricket legend Sunil Gavaskar also had a comparable assessment

In the meantime, the CSK captain didn’t do too well with the bat, but he was spot on with his bowling changes and field placements on the slow, dry Chepauk pitch.

CSK will now wait for the Eliminator and second Qualifier results to find out who they will play in the IPL 2023 final on Sunday at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.