MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Sanjay Bangar. Photo- Twitter-Getty
MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Sanjay Bangar. Photo- Twitter-Getty

MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli are inarguably two of the best captains the Indian team has ever had. MS Dhoni ruled the roost with three ICC trophy wins and took India to the no.1 rank for the first time. Kohli, on the other hand, kept India no.1 for five years straight and won the maiden Test series in Australia.

MS Dhoni had a unique cricketing brain that he used to remain cool and composed even in the most stressful situations. While Virat Kohli inspired a generation of Indian cricket fans, he also raised awareness about fitness and wellness.

Dhoni also groomed Virat Kohli into captaincy as the Delhi cricketer became vice-captain in 2014 and took over as captain fully in 2017. Kohli had a brilliant stint as India’s captain. Perhaps not winning an ICC title remained the only blip for Kohli as captain.

Both he and Dhoni batted their best for the team as captain, and the captaincy did not put them under pressure but rather brought out the best in them as players.

Sanjay Bangar compares captaincy styles of MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli

Former India batting coach Sanjay Bangar saw both MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli captaining the Indian team from close quarters. On an appearance on a podcast, Bangar detailed the differences between the captaincy styles of MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli.

“MS as a captain made sure that he eliminated all risks and he thought of all angles before walking in. He was of that belief that if I am walking into something I should know everything about it, I should cut down all risks and only then I will take a call.

I will wait for the opposition to make a mistake and that actually helped him achieve phenomenal success in ODI cricket or white-ball cricket, wherein he mastered the art of handling spinners and he read the game so well. That was his hallmark,” said Bangar on Rao Podcast.

He then stated that Virat Kohli had a completely different way of leading the team. MS Dhoni was cool, calm, and poised, whereas Kohli was aggressive and in your face. A little fight with the competition energized him and brought out the best in him.

“As far as Virat Kohli is concerned, he was driven by the fact that India had to improve their performances overseas. Because in India we knew that with all due respect to the opposition, if you come to India, India is winning 75 percent of the time, you will have to play poorly to lose in India because that is the skill and the talent that we possess.

It is basically the challenge of winning outside and that is where Virat’s contribution has been massive in terms of identifying that the team is going to play with five pure bowlers, wherein the batsman will need to take extra responsibility, but we make sure that we dismiss the opposition twice,” Bangar said on Kohli.

MS Dhoni, led India in 332 matches as captain running 178 matches and losing 120 maintaining a winning percentage of 53.61. On the other hand, Virat Kohli led India in 200 matches winning 128 matches and losing 55. He maintained a winning percentage of 64.

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