Former Indian Test opener Sadagopan Ramesh has questioned Zaheer Khan’s appointment as the new Chennai Super Kings head coach for IPL 2027. Khan doesn’t have head coach experience at the top level and he will take over from Stephen Fleming, who was associated with CSK for 18 years.
The former Indian fast bowler served as Mumbai Indians’ Director of Cricket Operations ahead of IPL 2019, before becoming their head of global development.
More recently, he was named Lucknow Super Giants’ mentor for IPL 2025 but didn’t continue in the next season.
Sadagopan Ramesh said on his Instagram handle, “Zaheer was a great cricketer and a fantastic bowler. But his only coaching experience has been working in the cricketing operations for MI from 2018 to 2022 and one year with LSG as mentor. However, this is the first time he’ll be the head coach of an IPL franchise. So we have to keep our fingers crossed.”
The former flamboyant batter highlighted that the five-time champions noted the success Ashish Nehra has had as Gujarat Titans’ head coach. Nehra led GT to glory in IPL 2022 and the franchise ended as the runners-up in IPL 2023 and 2026.
He said, “Finally, CSK have an Indian head coach for the first time. They’ve finally gone from a foreign coach mentality to an Indian coach mentality. I feel CSK saw the success of Ashish Nehra with GT and wanted to try something similar with the appointment of Zaheer Khan to see if it can spark a turnaround,” said Ramesh (via the aforementioned source).
Zaheer Khan scalped 102 wickets in 100 IPL matches while playing for RCB, MI and DC. Khan is regarded as one of the best fast bowlers produced by India, and he would look to get the best out of the players.
