Key Points

CSK were 145/4. Jadeja was well set. Mumbai Indians (MI) brought on a left-arm spinner to bowl to him. That over went for just a run a ball, and that too only because of a few wides. Mitchell Santner usually doesn't bowl at the death. Before this match, he had bowled just one full over between overs 17 and 20 in his entire IPL career, but MI held him back, especially in this situation, because his usual delivery spins into Jadeja's hitting zone.

Many teams bowl spin to Jadeja to slow him down. This season, he has faced 58 balls of spin and scored only 51 runs, a trend that has been continuing for the past few years. Jadeja has become good at hitting pace bowling, but still struggles when it is taken off.

"There's a lot of room for improvement in our view and it's a little bit of opportunity," CSK head coach Stephen Fleming said, as quoted from ESPNcricinfo.

"I know in the past that he's done it for a couple of games, but he hasn't had a big run at it, and it's more the attitude towards it," he added.

In the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025, Jadeja has hit just two boundaries against spin. Sometimes, it doesn't even look like he's trying. That's why teams keep bowling spin to him, even in the final overs. Head coach Stephen Fleming is trying to fix this.

"So we're exploring a lot of things at the moment to see whether there are gains within the side with one view on trying to win every game remaining in the IPL but also in the future," he said, as quoted from ESPNcricinfo.

"So we think there are areas that we can explore with our players where they haven't perhaps conquered it in the past and just trying to change some attitudes around it," he noted.

Before the game against Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH), Jadeja trained for about 30 minutes. He faced two leg-spinners and a throwdown specialist, focusing on stepping out and slog-sweeping. The results were mixed, and he's not alone in struggling.

Over the past 10 years of the IPL, looking at the first eight matches of each season, CSK's average (18.84) and strike rate (110) against spin are among the bottom five.

"We need the run production from the top to go well," Fleming said, as quoted from ESPNcricinfo.

"And that will then put players in the right position to perform their role that they've been designed for and enable us to capitalise on some of our players' strengths. (Shivam) Dube is playing a number of roles. He's holding the innings together and finishing games. In the past, he's been an impactful player who's come out and changed the game by his dominance in the middle (overs). So there's been a bit of a shift somewhere through the necessity to stay in the game," he noted.

In the past, CSK teams were good at hiding their weaknesses. That's why Jadeja batted lower down--not because he was a finisher, but because at No. 7 or 8, he would face more fast bowling, which he's better at attacking but now, with the top order out of form and the middle order unable to step up, the team looks very vulnerable.

- ANI