Dhoni won the 2011 ICC Cricket World Cup for India with his helicopter shot for six against Sri Lanka. On Saturday at the YS Rajasekhara Reddy ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium here, he won the match with his trademark shot, though it went wide of long-on, to help RPS finish their otherwise disappointing season with a win.
Mahendra Singh Dhoni has received a lot of flak for not being able to finish matches for Rising Pune Supergiants this IPL 2016. On Saturday, he silenced everyone with a knock that will go down as one of the greatest match-winning innings single-handedly played by an IPL batsman.
Dhoni won the 2011 ICC Cricket World Cup for India with his helicopter shot for six against Sri Lanka. On Saturday at the YS Rajasekhara Reddy ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium here, he won the match with his trademark shot, though it went wide of long-on, to help RPS finish their otherwise disappointing season with a win.
Dhoni finished with 64 runs scored at a strike rate of two runs every ball. From an improbable equation of 70 needed in the last five overs, Dhoni kept the faith that he can win it for RPS. With Sri Lankan Thisara Perera, Dhoni added 58 in 29 balls for the sixth wicket. When Perera was dismissed by Mohit Sharma in the first ball of the 19th over, RPS needed 29 in 11 balls. Dhoni let R Ashwin face only one ball. Mohit conceded only six runs in that over. Dhoni still maintained his calm. He took a single off the last ball to retain strike in the last over, off which 23 were needed.
A game that was in KXIP’s control for 39 overs, was lost in that one unforgettable over of Dhoni’s brilliance that was all about his confidence and self-belief. Left-arm spinner Axar Patel had to bear the brunt of Dhoni’s assault, three sixes and a four coming off India’s limited-overs captain’s blade.
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KXIP head coach Sanjay Bangar, who was until the recent ICC World T20, India’s batting coach would have been proud of Dhoni’s knock on any other day. But not on Saturday.
“Obviously a disappointing end to the season. We were wanting to end the season with a win but MS (Dhoni) actually took the match away from us,” Bangar said here on Saturday after the four-wicket loss his team suffered.
“But apart from that, felt that we played some really good cricket throughout the season. The margin of defeats have been really, really slim. They could have gone either way. I cannot doubt the efforts put in by the players. We need to accept that the performances weren't really up to the desired level.”
One of the reasons for KXIP finishing last for a second successive season has been the failure of their foreign players except for Marcus Stoinis to some extent.
Bangar admitted that the foreigners were hurt for their inconsistencies. He said: “You bank on the overseas players who are top-class professionals to come out and perform for your side. But, as I said earlier, I cannot doubt the efforts. At times, the players who have been very consistent for the franchise haven't turned up that performances that were expected of them. I'm pretty sure they are as hurt as professionals as everybody around the team is.”
Summing up the team’s performance this season, the former India all-rounder said: “Start of the season, midway through the innings, we lost a couple of key wickets in the same over. We did the same mistakes in the first five-six games. After that every game we competed really well, but couldn't really close games. The three games that come to my mind are the KKR game, wherein we lost by seven runs in Kolkata, the Royal Challengers Bangalore game wherein we lost by one run. And again (today), if you've got 23 to defend in the last over, obviously you'll give the bowling team a big, big chance to come out winners. But that was not to be. Basically those three losses really hurt us, they were really, really close games and had we won those close games we would have been higher up on the table.”
Bangar added that execution in the death overs were not always up to the mark. “The execution, at times, wasn't really great. Mohit Sharma fought back really well by bowling the 19th over, executed his yorkers well and gave the bowler a chance in the 20th over. But as I said earlier, I don't really want to pin-point at any individual, but the execution wasn't really great and we failed to finish a lot of key games wherein the game hung in the balance.”
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