Mahendra Singh Dhoni by CricketArchive Staff Reporter

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Player:

MS Dhoni

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DateLine: 5th May 2009

 

The man with the Midas touch, Dhoni has brought huge success for Team India since taking over the reins. His first assignment as skipper was the T20 World Championship in South Africa. The team was without the likes of Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid, but his inspired captaincy lifted the spirits of a young Indian side and they came out as eventual champions.

 

That was the beginning of a roller coaster ride which saw the Indian team under him defeating the likes of Australia in Australia, Sri Lanka in Sri Lanka and the latest casualties in the list were the Kiwi side who were defeated by an Indian side after 41 years.

 

Dhoni has been swashbuckling in front of the stumps and fluent behind them. The right-handed batsman has been the mainstay of the middle order and his ability to change the course of the match, whatever situation it might be in, has been outstanding.

 

It took MSD four years to make his place in the national side since making his domestic debut in 1999-2000. After a disastrous debut in which he got run out for a duck, he came back with a bang scoring 148 in just his fifth ODI played against Pakistan. Then came the defining knock, when this lad from the hinterlands of Jharkhand, went on to score a colossal 183 not out against Sri Lanka, smashing Gilchrist's record of the highest score by a wicketkeeper batsman.

 

Dhoni also leads the Chennai Super Kings outfit in the Indian Premier League and the team reached the finals in the tournaments first edition, where they lost to Shane warne's Rajasthan Royals.

 

The Indian team under him would look to defend the crown this time around and looking at the form of most of the players, it should be said that MS has a good chance to lift his second World Cup in a row.