The former Indian cricketer MS Dhoni is touted as the most successful skipper ever by his fans because he is the only captain to win T20 World Cup, ODI World Cup and Champions Trophy as well. Dhoni started as a top order batter but with time, he shifted to middle order and ended his international career as one of the best finishers of all times.
Some time back, the former Indian cricketer Gautam Gambhir said in a sports show that MS Dhoni sacrificed his batting position for trophies. Gambhir was a part of the Indian team which won the 2007 T20 World Cup and the 2011 ODI World Cup under Dhoni’s captaincy. While praising MSD, Gambhir says that everyone talks about MS Dhoni’s achievement as a skipper which is completely true but he feels that because of captaincy, Dhoni had to sacrifice the batter in him otherwise he could have achieved much more as a batter which didn’t happen.
Gautam Gambhir states that this happens when a person becomes the captain because then he thinks about the team and not about himself. Gambhir concludes by saying that if MS Dhoni had not been the skipper, then he would have batted at number 3 and must have scored many more runs and hundreds than what he has scored now.
Now, the Indian cricketer S Sreesanth who was also a part of India’s T20I World Cup winning squad has shed his opinion in this regard and he feels that MS Dhoni didn’t sacrifice his batting position.
While speaking in an interview, S Sreesanth said that recently Gautam Gambhir said that MS Dhoni would have scored more runs while batting at number 3 but for MSD, victories were always more important than runs. Sreesanth said that Dhoni had the capability to change the course of the game with bat whenever the team needed it and this is why, he won two World Cups.
Sreesanth added that Mahi didn’t sacrifice his batting position, he just came out with a way to see which batter performs the best at which position and then he placed them accordingly at those positions. S Sreesanth credited MS Dhoni for bringing the best out of his teammates and for always thinking about the team first.
With whom do you agree – Gautam Gambhir or S Sreesanth?