The one man who appears to be the most relieved after the 3-2 win in the five-match one-day cricket series against England is the Indian captain, Mahendra Singh Dhoni.
It should be a shot in the arm for him after India’s humiliating defeat in the test series against the same opponent late last year, which was followed by a dismal performance in the much-hyped two Twenty-20 games and the three-match one-day series versus Pakistan, which marked revival of cricketing ties between the two neighboring nations after five years.
Doubts had been raised and questions asked about Dhoni’s captaincy since India’s disastrous performance in England and Australia last year. With India performing badly in the four-test series against England even at home, after an almost forgotten 2-0 win over the lowly New Zealand, critics had been more vociferous in demanding Dhoni’s removal from the helm.
Victory in the one-day series against England, which ended in Dharamsala on Sunday, could not have come at a more opportune time both for Dhoni and the demoralized Indian team.
“Success always tastes sweeter, and this win should do our confidence a world of good,” the Indian captain said in a brief interview. “The credit goes to the entire team.”
Dhoni is heading an Indian team that is in transition following the successive retirement of key players like Anil Kumble, Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid and V.V.S. Laxman. With the star batsman Sachin Tendulkar getting longer in the tooth, experienced batsmen like Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir in unpredictable form and the fast bowler Zaheer Khan no longer what he used to be because of his age and fitness problems, Dhoni has very limited resources at his command.
Geoffrey Boycott says that India is “damn lucky” to have “a brilliant one-day captain” in Dhoni. The former England captain said that Dhoni is in charge of an “average team,” which makes it impossible to win, but noted that as captain, Dhoni would get the blame for losses.
But the fact remains that India has won two World Cups – the inaugural Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa in 2007 and the traditional 50-overs-a-side World Cup in India in 2011 – under Dhoni. In all, Dhoni has led India in 135 One-Day Internationals and won 77 and lost 47 of them (eight were abandoned while three ended in a tie).
The highlight of the one-day series win against England was the consistently impressive performances by Suresh Raina and Ravindra Jadeja, the two enormously talented youngsters Dhoni has always backed. Raina, who was declared the Man of the Series, scored 50 in the first One Day International in Rajkot, 55 in the second in Kochi, 89 not out in the fourth in Mohali and 83 in the fifth in Dharamsala. (He did not get to bat in the third in Ranchi.)
On the other hand, Jadeja not only scored 128 runs — including an astonishing match-winning innings of 61 not out off just 37 balls with 8 fours and 2 sixes at Kochi — at an average of 64.00, but also took 9 wickets, most of them at crucial junctures, at 15.77 apiece.
With Dhoni at the helm, Raina and Jadeja, as well as Virat Kohli, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ravichandran Ashwin and Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who are all gifted players, will form the nucleus of India’s team in the coming years.
With a morale-boosting series win under their belt, Dhoni and company should now look forward to taking on Australia in the four-test home series in February and March with a renewed confidence.
India Ink: Sweet Taste of Victory for Dhoni and Co.
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India Ink: Sweet Taste of Victory for Dhoni and Co.
