It is widely accepted that it was
former captain Sourav Ganguly who inculcated the winning mindset in Team India.
What MS Dhoni did was to take it a step further.
He indeed got a team that had
several complete players handed over to him by Ganguly. But, Dhoni instilled
the belief in the team that winning was no big deal, that India was supposed to
win, more often than not.
It was the 4th match of the CB
series on the India tour of Australia in 2008. India had dismissed Australia
for just 159 on the back of a 4-wicket haul from Ishant Sharma and a 3-for from
S Sreesanth. With 10 runs to win, Dhoni called for a needless glove change.
The message delivered to the dressing room was that there was no need to celebrate vehemently once the win
was achieved. He then gave directions to Rohit Sharma, who was batting
alongside him, to shake hands confidently with the Aussies after the victory
and not show even a hint of excitement.
The idea behind all this was that
Dhoni did not want it to seem like an upset. Yes, our bowlers dismissed you for
159, and we won the game by five wickets. It was no big deal. Dhoni wanted to
hit home the message that this was how it was supposed to happen, that this was
the new order.
It is just one of many ways in which he nurtured
the psychology of the Indian cricketers of his generation and taught them a few
crucial life lessons along the way.
When the win achieved in the
aforementioned game, Dhoni was unbeaten on 17 off 54 deliveries, batting at a
strike rate of 31.48. The victory finally came on the last ball of the 46th
over.
It was another of Dhoni's tactics which
surprised many. Despite possessing the destructive game, he did not mind
batting in the test match mode when the situation demanded him to do so, even
in white-ball cricket. Some may argue he went overboard with the idea, but this
is how he liked to approach the game.
His philosophy has always been to
take the match as deep as possible during the chase. Dhoni feels that in that
situation, the pressure on the bowler is equivalent to that on the batsman
regardless of the margin between the runs required and balls remaining. It is
only then that the battle between bat and ball can take place, on a plain
playing field. The former captain backed himself to emerge victorious nine
times out of 10 from such pressure situations. To his credit, he did succeed
far more often than he didn't.
Dhoni captained India in 200
ODIs, out of which the team won 110 and lost 74. Even if we keep the captaincy
aspect aside, which was undoubtedly instrumental to India's success during his
career, Dhoni averaged over 50 in ODI cricket and scored over 10,000 runs from
350 ODI matches at a strike rate of 87.56, with 10 centuries and 73
half-centuries.
Given that he batted at 6
(plus-minus 1) through most of his career, the stats become all the more
impressive as it is not common for batsmen not batting in the top order to have
such phenomenal numbers. In test cricket as well, he finished with a handy
average of 38 and became the first and the only Indian wicketkeeper to score a
test double.
But Captain Cool, as he will
always refer to as, had a lot more to give beyond these numbers. When Chennai
Super Kings beat Sunrises Hyderabad by 8 wickets in the final of IPL 2018 to
lift their third IPL trophy (all under Dhoni - he is the most successful IPL
captain behind Rohit Sharma) upon their return to the competition, the entire
team ran onto the field to celebrate the victory. On the contrary, Dhoni did
not show any overt emotions.
This is linked to the
aforementioned tactic but also became second nature for Dhoni as his career
went on.
Dhoni never batted by the book;
neither did he captain by it. The move to hand Joginder Sharma the last over in
the 2007 T20 World Cup which brought India their second ICC trophy and the decision to promote himself ahead of Yuvraj Singh in the final of 2011
World Cup which brought India their second ODI World Cup are all manifestations
of Dhoni's bigger game plan as a cricketer.
Even in retirement, he reiterated
what he stood for throughout his career - no flashy press conference, no
extensive press release, no emotional thank you speech; just a two-line Instagram post, and
that's it... the game goes on.