Vaathi coming to Chennai: IPL 2023 trends after Ganguly's announcement as fans can't wait for MS Dhoni's return

The 16th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) in 2023 will see the return of traditional home-away format as confirmed by the BCCI president Sourav Ganguly. Since 2019, the tournament hasn't been played in the traditional format.

The 2020 season was scheduled entirely in the UAE. In 2021, the IPL returned to India but it was played in Mumbai, Chennai, Delhi and Ahmedabad with home teams not having matches in those cities before the season got suspended and returned for the second leg in the UAE. The 2022 season, all the 70 league matches were played at four grounds in Mumbai and Pune before the knockouts were played in Kolkata and Ahmedabad.

In a note to all the state associations, the BCCI wrote, "The next season of men's IPL will also go back to the home and away format with all ten teams playing their home matches at their designated venues.

The moment it was confirmed that IPL will return to the usual format in India, IPL 2023 started trending on Twitter which can mean only one thing - the return of MS Dhoni. he fans can't wait to get a glimpse of Dhoni in front of roaring Chepauk crowd. Here are some of the reactions:

Dhoni, who returned to captaining Chennai Super Kings in IPL 2022 midway through the tournament after Ravindra Jadeja resigned from the post, confirmed during the season that he will return in 2023 as he wants to play in front of Chennai fans. Playing in IPL 2023 will also allow him to play in cities like Delhi, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad among others and pay his gratitude to all the fans as he said after CSK were eliminated from the league stage this year.

"Definitely, I will play next year. It would be unfair to not play in Chennai. It won't be nice to the CSK fans. Whether 2023 will be my last year or not, that is something we will have to see.

"And also, hopefully, next year there will be an opportunity where the teams will be travelling so it will be like a thank you to all the different places where we will be playing games at different venues. Whether it will be my last year or not, that's a big question because you know we can't really predict something two years down the line, but definitely, I'll be working hard to come back strong next year," Dhoni had said on May 20, 2022.