No Hard Feelings With Mumbai Indians Says Harbhajan Singh

Published - 31 Jan 2018, 12:54 AM | Updated - 22 Aug 2024, 11:48 PM

Chennai Super Kings has picked up Harbhajan Singh in the 2018 IPL auction.

Out of favour Indian spinner, Harbhajan Singh is looking forward to his stint with the Chennai Super Kings in the upcoming season of the Indian Premier League. He was a match winner for the most successful side in the tournament, Mumbai Indians for 10 seasons and now he will represent the “Whistle Podu” who will be returning to the tournament after serving a ban of a couple of years.

Bhajji had admitted that Chennai was his most difficult opposition during his time with the Mumbai Indians over the last decade. He has been also seen as Ravichandran Ashwin’s replacement who had served Chennai Super Kings for the first 8 years. While talking to the Mumbai Indians, he got pretty nostalgic about his stint with the Mumbai Indians but was quick to add that his main aim will be to win the tournament with the yellow brigade.

When asked how does he feel to be part of the CSK unit Harbhajan said, “Obviously I am excited about it. They are one of the strongest teams ever in the IPL and I am looking forward to be part of the team.” When asked whether he was surprised that Mumbai didn’t bid for him Harbhajan replied

(Photo by Jan Kruger-IDI/IDI via Getty Images)

“Well, for 10 years I was part of that team and time simply flew. It doesn’t matter if I was surprised or not, every team has its own planning and they went about their job. They clearly told me about what they felt about player retention and I have no hard feelings, I respect their decision. They are looking to build the team for the future and I am thankful to MI for the brilliant 10 years and the five trophies (three IPLs and two Champions League titles) that I won with them. But now it’s time to move ahead and you cannot get a better team than CSK,” Bhajji said.

When asked about MS Dhoni as a skipper under whom he played a lot of cricket and also got dropped under his tenure said,” Dhoni is calm, composed and he and has a sensible head on his shoulders. I am looking forward to reuniting with him, if not for the blue of India, at least the yellow of CSK. And knowing the Chepauk wicket, it may be a blessing in disguise for me that I am playing for CSK. There will be assistance for the spinners and who knows, if I take a lot of wickets, I may come back into India reckoning after a good season.

When asked how he feels that CSK has replaced Ashwin with him despite the latter having a great fan base here, Bhajji said, “I know Ashwin has his own fanbase and that is perfectly fine. But at the end of the day, many of them are CSK fans and they will support whoever plays in yellow.”