The former Indian captain MS Dhoni’s batting skills have once again been under the radar of the criticizers after New Zealand beat India in the second T20I of the three-match series in Rajkot. Dhoni played ten dot balls in his innings as the men in blues fell short by 40 runs in a high scoring match. Although, Dhoni played a knock of 49 runs from 37 balls, but was not able to score at a pace required to chase a mammoth total of 197. His inability to score quickly was pointed out earlier by many former International including Ajit Agarkar and VVS Laxman.
Now, the former India opener Virender Sehwag has come out and has asked the team management to specify a role for the two time World Cup winning captain in the Indian T20 team. Dhoni’s inability to rotate the strike in the middle was also one of the important reasons that he couldn’t score at the required run-rate.
The swashbuckling opener while talking to India TV said:
“Dhoni should realize his role in the team. He has to change the momentum early while chasing a strong total. He has to score from ball one and the team management should make him understand this point.”
However, Sehwag was of the opinion that Dhoni is still an asset in that young T20 team led by Virat Kohli.
“Team India needs MS Dhoni at the moment, even in T20 cricket. He will step down at the right time. He will never block the way for any young cricketer,” the cricketer from Delhi stated.
Sehwag also urged Dhoni to play his natural game and start scoring from the first ball when he takes on the field for the series decider against the strong Kiwi side in Thiruvananthapuram on 7th of November. Everybody will have an eye on MS Dhoni when he goes out to bat in the middle.
Sehwag has donned the India jersey in 104 Test matches and 251 ODI’s scoring more than 8000 runs in each format. He is the only Indian batsman to score two triple hundreds in Test Cricket.