Deprived of home advantage for the entire 2018 season, Chennai Super Kings will have to work hard in their adopted home venue in Pune to be a force to reckon with in the ongoing Indian Premier League, says the team's head coach Stephen Fleming.
Back in the IPL family after serving a two-year suspension, Chennai Super Kings lost their home advantage after just one game in Chennai as the IPL’s orgainsers decided to shift its remaining home games to Pune in the wake of protests related to Cauvery issue and threats to disrupt more fixtures.
Fleming rued the fact that his players will need time to get used to the Pune pitch.
"We are going to be careful that we don't get carried away by the loss. The biggest thing for us is to get to know the pitch here, it is not Chennai. We picked the side which was going to be Chennai-based so we are learning as much as anyone," said Fleming after CSK lost by eight wickets to Mumbai Indians in Pune on Saturday night.
"We have to work extra hard to get home advantage. We have learnt a little bit again today and we have only got a day to make sure we try and get the right combination," he added.
Sent in to bat, CSK scored 169 for 5, a target Mumbai overwhelmed in 19.4 overs.
Fleming said they were probably 10-15 runs short of what could have been a winning total.
"We were in the fight. (But) we were probably 10 runs, may be 15 runs short with the bat. But we hung in pretty well and created opportunities."
CSK suffered its first defeat at its 'adopted home' in Pune and its second in the tournament so far, courtesy a stunning performance by Mumbai Indians’s batsmen Rohit Sharma, Suryakumar Yadav and Evin Lewis.
"A score of 190 was a possibility, so for them (Mumbai) to bowl well and drag us back to 170 was good cricket. Another 10 (runs) would have been nice for us," the former New Zealand skipper said.
"He (Rohit) responded well in the 19th over and you are not going to win every game in the IPL. It was good game," Fleming added.
Rohit turned things around in the 19th over after he hit pacer Shardul Thakur for four boundaries.
Fleming also informed that pacer Deepak Chahar, who suffered a hamstring injury, will be out for a couple of weeks.
"He (Chahar) has had hamstring injuries in the past so he has a good idea when he is in trouble. He will probably take a couple of weeks, which is a bit of blow to us," he said.
