Bengaluru: Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s monk-like attitude and his ability to stay cool under pressure has been well chronicled. On Wednesday night, at the M. Chinnaswamy stadium, the skipper took the term to a new level altogether.
Getting Hardik Pandya to bowl the final over with other options in Suresh Raina and Yuvraj Singh, though the latter was unused, turned out to be a masterstroke.
It wasn’t a spur of the moment decision as he had already used up his stock bowlers — Ashish Nehra, R. Ashwin and Jasprit Bumrah by the final over. It was a make or break case with 11 needed and Dhoni went in with Pandya, who he believes has the ability to hit the deck hard.
Following the eventful over which will be played over and over again, in the minds of many, Dhoni gave a little insight into what goes on in his mind at such situations. Surprisingly, he says it’s ‘chaotic’ given the varied opinions players come up with.
“I think what’s important is to listen to everyone. In situations like this it’s literally chaos. You’re trying to manage chaos,” revealed Dhoni.
“Out there in the middle things really get heated up between the opponents; it’s just that we were made to realise it happens within the team as well.
“Everyone will have his own opinion, often the opinion of a batsman is very different to that of a bowler, but what you have to do is see what the strength of a batsman is who is batting at that point of time. How the wicket is behaving. Whether there is reverse swing or not, all these things you need to calculate.”
With Bangla needing 11 off six, Dhoni pinned his faith in Pandya and it hit pay-dirt not before some heart-in-the-mouth mom-ents when Mushfiqur Rahim looked to take the match away.
“It was quite an easy decision, the reason being that the batsmen were scoring quite freely and I knew that I had to take that one over from somebody. There were quite a few options, Yuvraj Singh, Suresh Raina, Hardik Pandya.”
Dwelling on the youngster’s confidence, who plays a brand of hugely competitive cricket and wears his heart on his sleeve, Dhoni said: “As far as Hardik is concerned, he is going through a phase where there will ups and downs. As a youngster you are full of confidence and that’s where cricket steps in,” he added.
