Former BCCI president N Srinivasan on Saturday said Chennai Super Kings would come back with a bang with former India skipper MS Dhoni as captain, cricbuzz reported.

Speaking at the Madras Advertising Club’s annual award function, the India Cements chief spoke extensively about CSK’s return to the Indian Premier League fold.

“If you are a CSK fan and are a cricket aficionado, you want to see MS Dhoni leading the side again in 2018. You want him to walk out wearing yellow. There is every possibility of that happening and next year,” Srinivasan said.

The former BCCI chief said Dhoni was key to the success of the franchise and revealed that he faced opposition when bidding for Dhoni.

“Before the first auction, we told the group which was sitting there to get MS Dhoni at any price. People criticised it and made all kinds of allegations, but still its [CSK’s] followers have only grown.

“Wherever I go, thanks to the power of CSK, there is not a single place where people don’t want to come and take a selfie with me. How did we get there? The first truly game changing decision was to get MS Dhoni on board. He had won the World T20 in 2007, had his own style and was different from others,” elaborated the former BCCI boss.

CSK, which is serving a two-year ban imposed by the Supreme Court, is set to return in 2018. “You can accuse anybody of anything but you can’t accuse a single player. They just played. It was just pure jealousy,” Srinivasan lamented.

This isn’t the first time, Srinivasan has spoken of the jealousy angle. In 2013, during a speech at Alagappa College of Technology, Srinivasan had spoke along the same lines.

“Why do you think people are jealous of CSK (Chennai Super Kings)? It is because of Dhoni. There was a savage attack on me (recently) because I have Dhoni,” Srinivasan had then said.

The franchise was also hit with conflict of interest as Srinivasan, was also an office-bearer with the BCCI at the time, but reiterated his stand that the franchise was formed after a consensus among its members and a green light from then president Sharad Pawar.

“We received an invitation from the then chairman of IPL (Lalit Modi) asking whether India Cements would bid. So I took this letter and wrote to the then BCCI president Mr (Sharad) Pawar asking if we can bid since I was the BCCI treasurer and MD and promoter of India Cements. Although everyone knew this story, they chose to ignore it,” Srinivasan said.

“I get a reply back from Mr Pawar saying that ‘I have consulted all my colleagues and there is no bar on India Cements to take the tender and bid for an IPL team’. This was given in writing from him and following all due processes, the BCCI was asked and we went ahead,” added Srinivasan.