Ever since his retirement from international cricket in 2020, Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s fans had to wait for the Indian Premier League (IPL) to catch a glimpse of the two-time World Cup-winning former India captain, donning the Chennai Super Kings Yellow jersey. However, all this while, an inevitable question hangs heavy: ‘Until when?’

While Dhoni has dismissed the inquiry with cheeky replies over the years, his emotional response after CSK’s record-equalling fifth title triumph last year, indicated that the 2024 season could well be his swansong.

For now, it seems that the era under ‘Captain Cool’ has ended on the eve of the 2024 season, as Dhoni decided to step down from his role as CSK skipper, although he will continue as a player this IPL.

“MS Dhoni has handed over Chennai Super Kings’ captaincy to Ruturaj Gaikwad ahead of the start of TATA IPL 2024. Ruturaj has been an integral part of Chennai Super Kings since 2019 and has played 52 matches in IPL during this period. The team looks forward to the upcoming season,” said a CSK statement.

In all, Dhoni captained CSK in 235 of their 249 games in all competitions, leading them to two titles in the defunct Champions League T20 to go with the five IPL titles. He also captained Rising Pune Supergiant for 14 games during CSK’s two-year ban from the IPL in 2016 and 2017. In all, he led teams in 226 IPL games, which puts him far ahead of Rohit Sharma (158) on the captaincy chart.

This will be the second season when the CSK franchise will open their campaign without Dhoni as the skipper. Earlier, the Super Kings had given the captaincy to Ravindra Jadeja in 2022 but the left-arm spinner stepped down midway through the tournament following a series of losses and handed back the leadership role to Dhoni.

Though the move to name a new captain on the eve of the season opener might sound surprising to the outsiders, there has been a constant attempt from the franchise to develop a successor to Dhoni, who is turning 43 this year. While the move backfired in 2022, the CSK management roped in Ben Stokes in 2023 with that motive but the English all-rounder’s continuous struggles with injuries might have prompted them to go for young Gaikwad.

The 27-year-old Gaikwad, who was signed by the CSK in 2019, made his debut in 2020 and impressed the management by starting off with three Man of the match awards in three successive matches. In 2021, the Maharashtra right-hander ended up as the Orange Cap holder when CSK won their fourth title. And since then, he has never looked back.

In cricketing circles, it is believed that the seeds of a change in leadership were first sown during the 2022-23 domestic cricket season when Gaikwad spent considerable time with Dhoni while leading Maharashtra to the Vijay Hazare Trophy final.

And since then, he was being developed as a potential successor to the legendary MS Dhoni by the CSK management before the announcement was made public on Thursday.