CSK win with eight balls to spare
There might have been a minor blip in the middle but this has been a dominant showing from CSK to stretch their dominant home against RCB, who last beat them in Chennai back in the inaugural season of the IPL. Since then CSK have won all eight matches against RCB at home.
It is also a great start to the captaincy career or Ruturaj Gaikwad, who was told a week ago that he would be captaining CSK this IPL.
Faf du Plessis started like a high-speed train, but the spinners and Mustafizur Rahman pulled them back in the middle overs. The damage done was so much that even a 95-run stand off 50 balls to end the innings gave RCB only a below-par total.
Once Gaikwad and Rachin Ravindra got off to a quick start, this was always going to be a straightforward chase except for the short-ball barrage in the middle that tested CSK for a while. Shivam Dube and Ravindra Jadeja, though, saw them home with ease eventually.
Thanks for joining us for the first match of the IPL; we have two coming tomorrow, same place, same time.