CRICKET POLL

The Chennai Super Kings have zeroed in on Ayush Mhatre as the replacement player. The beleaguered franchise, struggling to find a proper combination this IPL, have decided to onboard the young Mumbai opener as a replacement for skipper Ruturaj Gaikwad, who has been ruled out of the season with an elbow fracture.

Cricbuzz understands that the five-time champions, languishing at the bottom of the points table, took the decision late on Saturday (April 13). He has been asked to join the franchise immediately but the earliest he can link up with the MS Dhoni-led squad is only a couple of days later. Mhatre, with a base price of Rs 30 lakh, was unsold in the auction.

"He will join the squad in Mumbai in a couple of days," a source close to CSK management told Cricbuzz. The CSK team is currently in Lucknow for their seventh game, which will be played at the Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Stadium on Monday night. Currently CSK have one win and two points, having suffered five losses on the trot. They play Mumbai Indians in Mumbai on April 20 at the Wankhede.

The CSK nod came after the franchise called Mhatre to Chennai for trials along with a couple of others - Urvil Patel of Gujarat and Salman Nizar of Kerala. Prithvi Shaw, out of favour with the IPL teams currently, was also in the reckoning but the team is understood to have picked Mhatre as a replacement for Gaikwad.

The 17-year old Mhatre is highly regarded in Mumbai's cricketing circles. In nine first-class matches, he has amassed 504 runs, including two centuries and a fifty. In seven List A games, he has already scored 458 runs, with two hundreds to his name. He debuted in first class cricket last October and many experts in Mumbai believe that he is an India material.