Who Will Captain CSK in IPL 2027: We are right in the middle of the international cricket season, with most major teams in the game currently playing either a bilateral series or participating in a multi-team competition. We are also months away from any major franchise T20 tournaments.
The Indian Premier League, played in the months of spring and early summer in India, is the crown jewel of franchise competitions in cricket. Not only is it the richest and most popular cricket tournament, but it also features most of the biggest names in the game.
We might be more than six months away from the start of IPL 2027, but speculations surrounding the Indian Premier League teams stir up year-round. And one question that has been asked by many recently is regarding the captaincy of arguably the most popular team in the league, the Chennai Super Kings.
Batter Ruturaj Gaikwad became the CSK skipper right before the start of IPL 2024. For the past three seasons, he has overseen the worst spell in franchise history. Between 2008 and 2023, the Super Kings played 14 IPL seasons, in which they won five and made it to the playoffs on 12 occasions.
However, over the past three seasons, this team has failed to finish in the top four and make it to the postseason.
And now, there is another candidate for captaincy in the CSK squad. Before IPL 2026, Chennai and the Rajasthan Royals made a massive trade: while the Royals received Ravindra Jadeja and Sam Curran, the Super Kings brought in IPL royalty in Sanju Samson.
Samson already had a lot of experience in leadership in the Indian Premier League. He led RR to multiple playoffs and even to their second-ever finals appearance in 2022. Apart from being arguably the best wicketkeeper in India, Sanju is also an explosive top-order batter, a key skill required by all T20 sides.
With all that being considered, coupled with the fact that after three poor seasons, the Super Kings have parted ways with their long-time head coach Stephen Fleming and replaced him with former Indian pacer Zaheer Khan, the question now stands: who will captain CSK in IPL 2027?
Who Will Captain CSK in IPL 2027?
With our two contenders, Ruturaj Gaikwad and Sanju Samson, before us, we must firstly look at the most direct comparison between the two, that being their performance on the pitch in the 2026 season of the IPL.
It was a dark season for the five-time champions, as they finished eighth on the points table with six wins and 12 points.
As for the individual performances of the two players in the spotlight, Sanju came into the side with massive hype behind him, as less than two weeks ago, he had been named the Player of the Tournament in the 2026 T20 World Cup. However, in the first three innings in yellow, Samson scored single-digit runs.
But then, in the fourth game against the Delhi Capitals, the Kerala native scored his first century for CSK. Then, a few games later, he scored another, this time against arch-rivals Mumbai Indians at the Wankhede. This made him the first Indian to score two tons in a season for the Super Kings.
Sanju Samson had a decent first season for CSK. With 477 runs in 14 games with an average of 43.36 and a strike rate of over 65, he was his team’s highest run scorer of the season.
On the other hand, Ruturaj Gaikwad had his worst statistical season with the bat for CSK in 2026. In the season where he played most, if not all, of his side’s matches in the IPL, 2026 was his lowest-scoring season. With 337 runs in 14 matches at an average of 28.08, with a dismal strike rate of 123.44 and only two half-centuries.
This head-to-head puts Sanju Samson in the clear lead. And while one might argue that the captaincy statistics of the two players in the IPL should also be considered. That will present us with skewed data, seeing that for much of his time at the helm for the Rajasthan Royals, Sanju oversaw a far superior T20 squad than what Gaikwad led for the past three seasons.
With all that being said, the decision for CSK’s leader next season will come down to things off the field. This includes how Zaheer Khan rates the two players as leaders, who shows better leadership in the off-season, and, most importantly, the team optics for the fans and the media.
In the eyes of the fans, while Ruturaj Gaikwad is a beloved player who came up through the team’s ranks as a youngster and became their most valuable batter this decade, Sanju Samson holds a special place in the heart of not only the CSK fans but also much of southern India, especially in Tamil Nadu.
Sanju’s affinity for Tamil culture, despite not being from the state, makes him a superstar in the state. Years before joining CSK, a vast portion of the team’s fanbase wanted Samson on the team. And while the majority of the reasons for this demand were his being an exceptional player, many also wanted him to play for a team in southern India.
That makes Sanju a great choice to lead the Chennai Super Kings in IPL 2027. However, this is where the last factor applies. In recent years, we have seen what removing popular players from team captaincy can do to an IPL squad.
The most glaring example of this phenomenon was CSK’s rival, the Mumbai Indians. When the team decided to remove Rohit Sharma from captaincy and pass the role onto Hardik Pandya, the team underwent what many described as a civil war. This friction showed up on the pitch as well, as MI finished at the bottom of the table the very next season.
So, taking away the captaincy from a popular player in the squad might hurt the team more than anything, which might be the deciding factor in determining CSK’s skipper in IPL 2027.
In the end, all we can do here is speculate. The decision will be made by the CSK higher-ups, which include Zaheer Khan and his team of coaches. We will most likely know the direction of team leadership in the coming months, as teams tend to announce their captains towards the end of the year, before the auction for the upcoming season.
Check Out: Who Will Captain CSK in IPL 2027
Get IPL 2027 Live Score, Team Updates, along with the Latest Player News at IceCric.News and Follow for Live Updates – Facebook & Instagram.
