For the better part of his career, Mahendra Singh Dhoni was known to be the calm finisher for his team needed. The former India captain’s measured approach with the bat, however, wasn’t the case to begin with.
During his first few years in international cricket, Dhoni went hell for leather every time he walked out to the middle. He showed his ability in his fifth One-Day International with a brutal 148 against Pakistan, before playing many more aggressive knocks for India.
Dhoni eventually changed his approach and built his game with controlled aggression to become one of the most successful finishers in white-ball cricket.
Now, Australian cricket legend and former India coach Greg Chappell has said he was the one who instilled a sense of discipline in Dhoni’s batting. Chappell said that while he was the coach of the Indian team, he inspired the ‘keeper-batsman to show more restraint and maximise his potential.
In a YouTube interaction with PlayWrite Foundation, Chappell remembered the 2005 ODI series between India and Sri Lanka, in which Dhoni played an epic knock of 183 not out off 145 deliveries, to shed light on how he motivated the right-hander to become a quality finisher.
Here’s what Chappell said:
I thought Dhoni was one of the most exciting young cricketers. He was very different from everyone else... very hard to bowl to. He was also the strongest, most powerful batsman I’ve seen. I’ve played with and against some very good players, but Dhoni’s ability to hit boundaries is greater than anyone else I’ve ever seen.
I remember having a conversation with him. We had a home series against Sri Lanka. Dhoni got a 180 in one game. He absolutely took them apart. He hit a lot of boundaries and he hit a lot of sixes. The next game was in Pune, and I remember having a conversation with him about his overall ability and I felt that if he just went through his career trying to hit boundaries and sixes, he may not achieve what he should achieve in cricket.
We talked about the fact that if he could learn to hit the ball along the ground as well... even though he was good at hitting boundaries, it was still a high-risk way of playing. If he could take some of that risk out of it, he could become one of the best finishers in world cricket. I remember that game in Pune, we didn’t have many to chase and when he came in, we had 80 or 100 runs to get.
So, I threw him a challenge to see if he could get all of his runs along the ground. I said, ‘We should win, but I want you to go out there and make sure we win it. You’re not allowed to hit the ball in the air until we’ve won the game. Somehow, you’ve got to find the thrill in being the best finisher rather than one of the best hitters of boundaries and maybe be remembered for some exciting innings, because you could become the best finisher the game has ever seen.’
Luckily, he took the challenge, although I remember RP Singh was the 12th man, and mid-way through his innings, he came to me and said MS wants to know if he can hit the ball in the air now. We still needed about 20 runs to win, so I said to RP ‘you go back and tell him, he can hit the ball in the air when we have won the game’.
We got towards the end of the game and we needed four to win, and he hit the biggest six straight down the ground and he ran off waving his bat in the air and he ran past me and asked ‘is that alright coach?’ I said that’s fine. He was a pleasure to work with. He has a great personality... great skill.