The injured Ruturaj Gaikwad will be replaced by opening batsman Ayush Mhatre for the rest of the 2025 Indian Premier League season by the Chennai Super Kings (CSK). The latter suffered an elbow injury that prevented him from playing the rest of the 2025 Indian Premier League. Prior to his campaign being curtailed by injury, he led CSK in the first five games. In their most recent match, on April 11, against the Kolkata Knight Riders, MS Dhoni was in control of the team.
During the 2024–25 Irani Cup Mhatre made his first-class debut at seventeen years old for the Mumbai team. During the 2024–25 Ranji Trophy Mhatre achieved his first first-class hundred by scoring 176 against Maharashtra. Mhatre achieved the remarkable distinction of becoming the youngest cricketer to hit 150-plus runs in List A men’s cricket by exceeding the previous record held by Yashasvi Jaiswal. His first-class success includes 504 runs from nine matches and a batting average of 31.50 and a strike rate of 72.93. His List A cricket career has featured seven matches with 458 runs for a 65.42 average and a 135.50 strike rate. He has accumulated two hundred runs and one fifty in each format of the game.
CSK’s decision confirmed following reports
The five-time winners, who are now at the bottom of the IPL points standings, made the decision late on Saturday, April 13, according to Cricbuzz. Although he has been requested to join the team right now, he can only join MS Dhoni and company a few days later. At the IPL 2025 mega-auction in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, Mhatre, who had a starting price of Rs 30 lakh, was not sold.
“He will join the squad in Mumbai in a couple of days,” a source close to CSK management told Cricbuzz. The CSK call-up came after the franchise called Mhatre to Chennai for trials along with a couple of other players – Gujarat’s Urvil Patel and Kerala’s Salman Nizar. Prithvi Shaw, out of favour with the IPL teams currently, was also in contention, but the team is understood to have gone ahead with Mhatre as a replacement for Gaikwad.
On Monday, April 14, CSK will play the Lucknow Super Giants at the Ekana Cricket Stadium in an attempt to win after dropping their previous five games.
