CHENNAI: Ajinkya Rahane’s 45 and some late hitting from MS Dhoni was not enough for Chennai Super Kings as Delhi Capitals registered their first win of this season of the Indian Premier League on Sunday.

Chennai Super Kings were rocked early in the chase when Khaleel Ahmed got the wicket of Chennai captain Ruturaj Gaikwad in the opening over. Rahane came all guns blazing straight away, but Rachin Ravindra could not find his feet and was caught by Tristan Stubbs to give Ahmed his second wicket.

Rahane and Daryl Mitchell first steadied the ship and attacked later to make the job harder for Delhi. Mitchell did hit Axar Patel for a six, but the spinner came back to take the New Zealand allrounder’s wicket. Mukesh Kumar took two wickets in two balls to rock Chennai in his very first over. Mukesh came back to remove Shivam Dube, who was looking threatening with the bat.

Dube’s wicket brought MS Dhoni in the middle with the bat for the first this season and the crowd favorite did not disappoint. The former captain smashed the first ball he faced from Mukesh for a boundary followed by one more in that over. At one moment it felt like Chennai were well and truly in the chase with Dhoni and Ravindra Jadeja in the middle, but Ahmed gave away 12 in his final over and Mukesh bowled one of the best penultimate over of the season to give only five runs from it. Dhoni freed his arms to score 20 runs off Anrich Nortje’s final over, but it was not enough for the defending champion as they fell short by 20 runs.

Earlier, looking to win their first fixture of the season, Delhi Capitals captain opted to bat first at their home ground at the Dr. Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium. Warner found a new opening partner in Shaw and the duo started cautiously against the Chennai pacers. However, Warner changed the momentum taking 18 runs off Deepak Chahar’s third over. Mustafizur Rahman was punished straightaway when Shaw hit three back-to-to-back boundaries off the Bangladesh pacer.