Former IPL winning captain Gautam Gambhir believes Chennai Super Kings (CSK) may eye England all-rounder Moeen Ali in the IPL 2021 auction. Gambhir feels their love for spinners may attract them towards Ali.
CSK have released the likes of Harbhajan Singh and Piyush Chawla before the auction. They are currently left with six slots, but only one of them is for overseas players.
Gambhir finds Ali a good addition to the CSK franchise for the upcoming IPL season. Speaking on Star Sports, he said, "They have let go of Harbhajan Singh. It's always important to cover all those bases. They have got two leg-spinners. They have got a left-arm spinner who can bat as well. More or less, everything covered. Maybe they would want an off-spinner who can bat a bit because if they have got a couple of left-handers in the opposition, they want an off-spinner.
"MS likes an off-spinner, they have always had one, they had Ashwin and then Harbhajan, especially with a finger spinner who could bowl with the new ball as well," he said.
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Apart from Ali, CSK can go after Krishnappa Gowtham who was released by Punjab Kings (earlier Kings XI Punjab). "K Gowtham could be a great addition, I think Moeen Ali will be a smart addition for CSK. Reason? Ali is two-dimensional, he can bowl, he can bat. He can bat at the top of the order, he can bat in the middle-order as well. He can bowl with the new ball also. He has done that in T20I cricket. He will be a great addition.
"It will cover a lot of bases as well. You want to start with Faf du Plessis and Ali at the top of the order, left and right combination. If you have got someone like Chris Gayle for Kings XI, then against him Moeen can start with the new ball. He can give you the firepower, which we have already seen in this rank-turner in Chennai."
Chennai have a salary cap of INR 19.9 crore left before the auction which is set to take place on Thursday (February 18).
CSK Squad (pre-auction): MS Dhoni, Suresh Raina, Ambati Rayudu, KM Asif, Deepak Chahar, Dwayne Bravo, Faf du Plessis, Imran Tahir, N Jagadeesan, Karn Sharma, Lungi Ngidi, Mitchell Santner, Ravindra Jadeja, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shardul Thakur, Sam Curran, Josh Hazlewood, R Sai Kishore.
(Inputs from Star Sports)
