MS Dhoni In IPL 2016: Analysing the RPS skipper's performance this season
"I would be lying if I say I have moved on from Chennai Super Kings," MS Dhoni said at a time when the new franchise Rising Pune Supergiants was being launched. He also said that it is certainly very different to play for any other team apart from CSK.
In many ways this was prophetic from Dhoni, it was certainly different. To see a team led by Dhoni struggle the way Rising Pune Supergiants struggled that too in the shortest format was different. To see Dhoni, the ice man lose his cool on the field was different. To see Dhoni consistently putting blame on his players for the defeat (which was justified in many ways) was different. It all boiled down to a constant struggle for one of the debutants this season and Rising Pune Supergiants finished 7th in the table.
Many though that Pune was just a mirror image of the Chennai Super Kings. And then the murmurs grew louder when they thumped defending champions Mumbai Indians in the inaugural match of the season. But few had foreseen the downward slide for the team. Dhoni had the company of Stephen Fleming, Ravichandran Ashwin and Faf du Plessis from his Chennai side, but the core was lost to Gujarat Lions as they snapped up Suresh Raina, Brendon McCullum, Dwayne Smith, Ravindra Jadeja and Dwayne Bravo. No wonder, Dhoni was left grappling to get the team combination right, and yes he did not get it right until the end.
That it was a nightmare season will not be an understatement. Within the first 10 days, Pune lost Kevin Pietersen, Faf du Plessis, Mitchell Marsh and Steven Smith to injuries. This was a body blow and understandably Pune never recovered. Injuries can never be predicted, but it certainly can be factored in at the auction table. Pune did not have suitable replacements and this hampered MS Dhoni big time.
Dhoni has been a captain who does not like to tinker too much with his team, but this season he was forced into changing players almost regularly. True the injuries did impact him massively but barring Ajinkya Rahane there was no one else who could be banked upon. Pune roped in Usman Khawaja and Geroge Bailey as late replacements but by then the ship had been wrecked.
When the going has got tough for an MS Dhoni-led team, he has tossed the ball to Ravichandran Ashwin. This time, it was different. Barring a handful of matches, Ashwin never bowled out his quota of overs. In fact, Ashwin bowled out in only 8 of the 14 matches. And then the treatment meted out to Irfan Pathan has resulted in many tasty conspiracy theories floating around.
If the captaincy looked out of depth, Dhoni's own form with the bat gave the tournament a miss. Yes, we will remember “ that final innings” against Kings XI Punjab when he smoked 23 off the final over, but barring this Dhoni looked jaded and out of sorts. Factor this: Dhoni played 23 balls against the Kolkata Knight Riders and scored 8 runs. In 14 matches this season, the skipper scored only 284 runs, and this includes the 64* he scored in that final game against Kings XI Punjab. This impeded Pune massively, and perhaps a more flamboyant Dhoni in the middle order could have had a more visible impact.
Also read: Gautam Gambhir vs MS Dhoni - Who is the better IPL captain?
Few can argue that there are better captains of spinners than Dhoni and when he did find Adam Zampa he looked a different captain. The Aussie leg-spinner picked up 12 wickets in the 5 matches he played, and this bodes well for the future for Pune.
If the batting looked shallow, Dhoni was stupendous as a wicket-keeper. The sight of him sticking out his right leg to stop the ball from rolling past him will be one of the images from the tournament.
If things were already not going pear shaped, rain and dodgy weather followed Pune all around. Sometime towards the end of the tournament, Dhoni remarked that they have now "ticked off a loss in a rain-hit match" when they lost to Kolkata Knight Riders at the Eden Gardens.
It is true that a captain is only as good as his team, but Dhoni being Dhoni it was expected that there would be the fight or a semblance of it. The biggest disappointment was the comprehensive nature of defeats. This was not a debut to remember for Pune, and after this season, Dhoni will certainly get over Chennai Super Kings and would love to do a better job next season.