There is a famous social media post circulating in cricket from the 2019 World Cup, when MS Dhoni left a Lockie Ferguson delivery, and the Kiwi bowler shrugged his shoulders. It was the semifinal of the 2019 World Cup when India were under a bit of pressure in terms of run rate when Dhoni decided to leave the ball as they needed 52 runs from 31 balls, and it was the final ball of the over. Ferguson recalled the incident and said he was surprised by Dhoni’s choice.
“I can’t remember what they were needing to chase at the time, but I knew they had to score a few runs. The plan was to bowl and see if MS would undercut it, and he left it. So I was surprised because naturally, when you’re bowling, you’re trying to restrict runs, then it’s nice when a batter leaves it,” said Ferguson speaking to CrickTracker.
“But I think the next over, the first ball, I tried again, and he just got it over the boundary for six. So the plan almost worked the second time as well. But it was nice to get him out that game and, of course, get across the line in the semi-final,” Ferguson added.
Eventually, New Zealand beat India by 18 runs and qualified for the final of the World Cup.
When Ravi Shastri was furious with MS Dhoni
Former Indian fielding coach R Sridhar recalls an incident in his book ‘Coaching Beyond: My Days with the Indian Cricket Team’ where the former Indian coach Ravi Shastri was infuriated with former Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni for his batting approach.
Recalling the second ODI between England and India at Lords in 2018, Sridhar mentioned the game whilst India were chasing a mammoth total of 323 runs courtesy of a brilliant Joe Root ton. India were 60-3 in the chase when Suresh Raina joins then-skipper Virat Kohli, Sridhar wrote, “We were in the hunt when Virat and Suresh Raina were batting, but as we lost wickets”.
A peek into Ravi Shastri’s approach as a coach.
Didn’t even spare MS!Excerpts from the book ‘Coaching Beyond’#CricketTwitter #Cricket pic.twitter.com/JPnBn3sdpb
— CaptainPLCC (@captain_plcc) January 12, 2023
After building a partnership of 80 runs Kohli fell and Raina too followed him. MS Dhoni was running out of partners. “MS was left with only the bowlers for a company going into the last 10 overs. Uncharacteristically, he shut shop, and even though our required rate in the last 10 was nearly 13 an over, we only managed some 20 runs in the next six overs. That was the innings when MS got to 10,000 ODI runs- a very significant milestone. We were all thrilled for him, but we also wanted to know why he hadn’t made even a token attempt at the target,” Sridhar wrote.
MS Dhoni scored 37 runs from 59 balls with just two boundaries letting the run rate go up.
Sridhar recalled how Shastri in the dressing room was fuming over Dhoni’s approach, “Ravi, meanwhile, was seething. He was furious not because we lost by 86 runs, but how we lost the game, how we went down without putting up a fight. We didn’t go for the target, we didn’t go down throwing a punch, we just went down tamely The head coach wasn’t going to let that one sail harmlessly by.”
