Former India opener Aakash Chopra has made a bold claim that Chennai Super Kings will definitely go after KL Rahul in the upcoming IPL 2025 auction. Rahul parted ways with Lucknow Super Giants and decided to register his name in the mega auction, which will take place on November 24 and 25 in Jeddah. The star wicketkeeper batter has not played a T20I for India since the 2022 T20 World Cup and is not in plans of the current shortest format set-up. Despite that, he will be one of the players to look out for in the auction as he has three different credentials - batting, wicketkeeping and captaincy – a rarity.

Rahul has set his base price at INR 2 crore, and there are few teams without a captain who will be looking to engage in a bidding war for him. Chopra suggested that CSK, who have already retained their last year's captain Ruturaj Gaikwad, will look to sign Rahul as a successor to their legendary wicketkeeper batter MS Dhoni.

"What all do they need? I feel they need a successor to Dhoni, a wicketkeeper-batter and it's great if they get an Indian. Everyone is saying, let me also say - he is more than 30 years old, is going to be a father very soon and everyone has written him off as well, so he is right for Chennai, that's KL Rahul. So they will definitely go for KL Rahul," Aakash Chopra said on his YouTube channel.

Chennai Super Kings in search of a wicketkeeper batter

However, the former cricketer-turned-commentator asserted that it won't be easy for CSK to get Rahul as they have an INR 55 crore purse in the auction, which won't allow them to bid massively for a single player.

"We can't say for how long they will go but they will try to acquire him because the franchise still has ₹55 crore to be spent. So if they can get an Indian like him, Ishan Kishan or Rishabh Pant for ₹10-15 crore, they are going to try. They might think about Shreyas Iyer for some time because they will need Indian batters to bat in those conditions," Aakash added.

He further suggested that Ravichandran Ashwin is another player, who CSK will target in the auction to strengthen their spin department.

"CSK has struggled with spin options apart from Ravindra Jadeja. Ashwin, who is also associated with CSK's academy, could bring balance to their attack in what might be his final IPL cycle," Chopra observed.

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