Australia vs India, 2nd ODI: What we learned from MS Dhoni's innings
Lightning rarely strikes twice. So, after a rare top-order collapse in the first ODI against Australia, in the second match at Adelaide, India’s top order was back to what it does best more often than not – bat well enough to take India to victory.
Apart from the superlative century from the chase master Virat Kohli which was his twenty first ton in a successful run chase, we had handy contributions from the two openers – Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan.
However, a lot of post-match discussions have veered around MS Dhoni's unbeaten innings today, with his last over six evoking memories of the now famous six in the 2011 world cup final. While it is important to hail India’s victory and the architects of this win including MSD, it is equally pertinent to not lose perspective of the former Indian captain’s innings.
Here is what we learned from Dhoni’s innings today.
Firstly, Dhoni still has it in him to understand the match situation and play accordingly. He did that brilliantly today, something he also attempted to do in the last ODI as well, though without the success he had today.
Like the last match, when he came to bat today, India had lost three wickets, but unlike last time, India had scored more than half the runs required for the chase. The required run rate was above 7 runs per over, but a well-set Kohli was at the crease.
He forged a half-century partnership, let Kohli score the bulk of the runs, and took India close to the target, without taking much of a risk. After Kohli’s departure, he upped his scoring rate, and in the company of a fluent Dinesh Karthik, took India home, signing off with a six and a single off the first two balls of the last over.
The above summary of Dhoni’s innings is a legitimate one and as Kohli described after the match, it was a typical Dhoni innings – the kind of innings Dhoni has played over and over again in his illustrious career.
However, among all this praise and glowing eulogies, this effort by Dhoni is also a reminder of a more somber aspect, which is this: Dhoni no longer has the responsibility to single-handedly take India home in a steep run chase.
He can forge match-winning partnerships as he did twice today, with Kohli and Karthik, but he is rarely the aggressor. He depends on his partner to score the bulk of the runs. Luckily for him, both Kohli and Karthik were in fluent form, which made Dhoni’s approach effective.
In the last two years, unlike what we used to see with Dhoni earlier, we are yet to see Dhoni taking upon himself the role of the aggressor in a partnership and succeeding. Until that happens, it will defy cricketing logic if someone says that the old Dhoni is back.
But then again, at this stage in his career and the world cup looming, it is still better to have the anchor Dhoni who scores valuable runs, never mind the strike rate, than a Dhoni who is short of runs, and low on confidence.