Dhoni aiming for a record ’High Five’

Agencies
Bellevision Media Network

New Delhi, 26 August 2010: Winning abroad for India was like Nelson Mandela’s long walk to freedom until Ajit Wadekar turned the tables on the invincible Windies in their den and then Kapil’s devils pulled global chins towards Indian cricket by winning the Prudential Cup (World Cup) in 1983 in England.

 

Sunil Gavaskar went on to extend that run up to 1985 when India won the World Championship in Australia, letting every critic know that the 1983 victory was no fluke.

 

A period of dryness in terms of overseas victories ensued until the mantle was grabbed by Sourav Ganguly in the late 90s and now is firmly in possession of MS Dhoni who is on the verge of a unique ’fiver’ – endeavouring to win his fifth ODI series in the isle in as many attempts.

 

 

While the team’s current antics exude little confidence, it still won’t be a howler to address MS Dhoni as ’Midas’ Singh Dhoni – instead of Mahendra – considering how series after series the charismatic skipper keeps embossing his name on captaincy records. The win at the P. Sara Oval in the final Test against Sri Lanka in Colombo kept Dhoni’s record of not losing any Test series as captain intact and now he is out to script another fairytale, this time in the ODIs.

 

Looking back at the tri-series, it has’t been easy for MS, though, with a couple of stalwarts missing in both bowling (Zaheer Khan and Harbhajan Singh) and batting (Sachin Tendulkar and Gautam Gambhir) and those present (except Sehwag), a long shot away from their best. But that’s how it started for Dhoni as well, when he marshaled the young Indian troops in South Africa in 2007 and won the inaugural T20 World Cup, against all odds. In fact, getting youngsters to perform has been Dhoni’s forte, with Suresh Raina being the torchbearer of that.

 

But the controversy-ridden tri-series has made this nut a tough one to crack for the Men in Blue. First it was the notorious Randiv no-ball, instigated by Dilshan, that denied Sehwag a deserving ton; then it was Sangakkara’s tiff with McCullum; and finally Dhoni’s post-match football drill delaying a scheduled press conference, which was then boycotted by the Indian print media.

 

To compound Dhoni’s problems, an ODI series on the back of a grueling Test series also took its toll on the team - ranging from injuries to mosquito bites. But somehow, Dhoni has managed with an uninspiring benchstrength and Team India has crawled its way to the final against Sri Lanka on Saturday.

 

Dhoni admitted that the absence of four regulars would create enough space for every youngster to get a chance and would be an ideal scenario to test their mettle before the World Cup in 2011. The same hasn’t transpired on the field though, with Saurabh Tiwary and R. Ashwin seemingly forgotten after being put on the backburner.

 

Now that the Dhoni brigade is one match away from clinching another victory on foreign soil, the skipper’s cached cogs will have to propel the wheels of India’s ODI convoy to the champion’s podium on August 28 and win their fifth consecutive ODI title on Sri Lankan soil under Dhoni.