Dhoni Escapes Sacking, Continues On As The Captain
A while back, rumors were doing the rounds that Mahendra Singh Dhoni will be out of cricket business soon. To say that the Indian team hasn’t done particularly well would be sugarcoating the whole unsavory scenario that has befallen our home team. It is quite natural, that some of the blame for India’s three series defeats should rest on the shoulder of the one who led the team through these matches- the captain.
People are maniacal, but they won’t move a muscle against their skipper; after all Dhoni was the underdog that they rooted for since 2004. All that the spectators can do is watch and try their level best to ‘not’ keep their opinions to themselves. Where would India be, if we didn’t follow the example of the barking dog that never bit anyone? So irrespective of what The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) decides, there will always be a bunch of us who will, with all the unbridled enthusiasm of an immature teenager, counteract the decision, replete with expletives and hand gestures.
India’s exit from the T20 World Cup held at the West Indies was the final straw. Suddenly it wasn’t just the people, but fellow cricketers chimed in to voiced their disappointment and disapproval of Dhoni as the captain of the Indian team. Former cricketers such as Sunil Gavaskar and Krishnamachari Srikkanth had previously urged the BCCI selectors to remove Dhoni from the position of the Test Captain following his flop show, last year. Bishan Singh Bedi, of the ex-cricketer fame, was the last to join the ‘sack-Dhoni’ club. He quickly dismissed Dhoni’s 99 runs as a trivial conquest and pitched the idea of Virat Kohli as the new Captain of the Indian Cricket Team. He prefers Kohli’s sharp as a tack cricketing strategy to Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s statistics. He further added that cricket is a young man’s game and that it is time to lose the dead weight and give the more capable players a chance to run the game.
All the five selectors of the BCCI committee were in sync with the decision to terminate Dhoni from the Captain position. But luck was on Dhoni’s side; Owner of Chennai Super Kings and BCCI president, N Srinivasan, intervened and allowed Dhoni to continue the captaincy. Following what transpired, Mahendra Singh Dhoni profile remains unscathed. Wish the same could be foretold for India’s cricketing future.
