CSK have not had a head coach since July, and Gaikwad says there is no rush
Stephen Fleming left Chennai in July and was named England’s Test coach 17 days later. Seven weeks on, CSK still have no replacement, and their captain says there is time.
Sep 2, 2026
Seven weeks after Stephen Fleming walked out of Chennai, the most successful coaching job in the IPL is still vacant. Ruturaj Gaikwad, asked about it by reporters in Coimbatore this week, did not sound worried.
“We will have a head coach,” he said. “There is still plenty of time before the IPL, so there is no rush to make a decision.”
He is right about the calendar and probably wrong about what the deadline actually is.
What CSK lost in July
Fleming arrived at Chennai Super Kings as a player in the first IPL season in 2008 and took over as head coach in 2009. He was still in the job this July, which in a league where franchises change coaches the way they change openers is close to unimaginable. Five titles came in that time. So did the two years of suspension, the rebuilds around an ageing core, and the whole Dhoni-to-Gaikwad handover.
He has not gone quietly into semi-retirement either. On 30 July the ECB named him England’s Test head coach on a four-year deal running to September 2030, with Joe Root returning as captain. Marcus Trescothick took the side on an interim basis through the Pakistan series while Fleming spent time at home in New Zealand. So CSK are not replacing a man who was winding down. They are replacing one who walked into an international job 17 days later.
The season that makes this urgent
CSK missed the IPL 2026 playoffs. They went into their last league game against Gujarat Titans needing a win and other results, lost, and were out. For a franchise whose entire identity is built on being in the last four almost every year, that is not a blip you shrug at, and Gaikwad’s own answer this week acknowledged as much when he asked supporters to be patient.
Chief executive Kasi Viswanathan has said the replacement will be an overseas coach. Beyond that, everything in circulation is reporting rather than announcement. Mike Hussey, the batting coach since 2018, is the obvious internal option. Mike Hesson, Brendon McCullum and Albie Morkel have all been floated in the Indian press. None of it has been confirmed by the franchise.
Why the real deadline is not March
Here is the part that makes “no rush” a slightly uncomfortable line. A head coach does more than turn up in March and pick an XI. He sits in the room where a franchise decides who to retain and who to let go, then spends the auction spending the money that decision freed up. Get the coach in late and you have either handed those calls to someone else or hired a man who inherits a squad he had no say in.
CSK have been here before, in a way. Fleming’s authority at Chennai came partly from having built almost every squad the franchise ever fielded. Whoever comes next starts with none of that, and starts with a batting group that could not get out of the group stage.
Gaikwad also spoke about his own position, which has been under a different kind of scrutiny since he took over from MS Dhoni. “As long as I continue to enjoy it, I’m happy to do it,” he said, which is a fairly honest thing for a young captain to say after a season like that one.
What to watch for
Two things. First, whether the appointment is genuinely an outside hire or Hussey moving up a chair, because those point at very different plans for the squad. Second, how soon it lands relative to the retention window. If CSK name their coach before the retention calls rather than after, the “no rush” line was strategy. If it comes after, it was a delay dressed up as one.