Mahendra Singh Dhoni anounced himself on the international scene more than 13 years ago at the ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium in Visakhapatnam as he tore into arch rivals Pakistan with a knock of 148 runs. Dhoni’s entry into international cricket had been rather subdued as he failed to get runs in his first four outings. The wicket-keeper batsman though launched his soon to be successful career with a tour de force at Vizag and has never looked back since.
More than a decade and nearly 10,000 ODI runs (for India) later Dhoni is back at the venue as part of the Indian team that will take on West Indies in the second of the five-match ODI series. The long tresses have been replaced by grey hair and greyer beard. While Dhoni returns to play his 7th ODI at this venue and has achieved almost everything that is there to achieve as a cricketer, he finds himself in a slightly uncomfortable position.
His performance in the 50-over format has been a shade paler than his own meteoric standards and that has led to growing criticism as India looks to shore up its iffy middle order ahead of the ICC World Cup in England next year.
But Dhoni isn’t one to be bothered by criticism and he has the full backing of the team management who have time and again stressed on Dhoni’s importance for the team. On Tuesday, Dhoni paid a visit to the pitch at the stadium in Vizag and did his customary check-up. BCCI tweeted with this message,”The KING is here! This ground and the city of Visakhapatnam has a special bond. Memories aplenty. Let’s create plenty more tomorrow.”
Dhoni inspecting pitches before a match and speaking with the groundsmen is not something new for those who have covered Indian cricket over the past decade. His ability to stay calm and positive ahead of the biggest of matches is what has made him one of the greatest cricketers of modern times.
The former India captain would now hope that this pitch has a lot of runs stored in it and he gets an opportunity get some of those runs under his belt on Wednesday to silence his critics again.
Dhoni has so far scored 240 runs from 4 innings at the venue at an average of 80 and has maintained healthy strike-rate of 107.62. He has a century and half-century to his name at Vizag.
