The former Indian captain has 18.4 million followers on Instagram, 7.7 million on Twitter and the entire stadium chanting his name, whether he plays or not. M.S. Dhoni is one of the best captains world cricket has ever witnessed, and numbers can prove that. Donning that No.7 jersey, with a typical smile and a cool head, Dhoni just doesn’t play the game but inspires youngsters into wearing those gloves and committing to national duty.
While battling situations and other bowlers on the pitch, Dhoni also found another way of entertaining the fans and keeping unwanted rumors out of sight- the method is called ‘the art of sarcasm’ and the 37-year old seems like a master at it.
Following are a few instances where Dhoni displayed sheer wit in front of media:
1) Sreesanth and Don Bradman:
Keep aside last year’s Border Gavaskar trophy, and one notices the struggle an Indian batsman faces while countering bounce in Australia. This point was raised during a press conference where Dhoni was asked to address these problems.
But the former captain didn’t budge and confidently defended all the batsmen by saying, “You won’t see a Sreesanth batting like a Don Bradman just because he wants to bat like one.”
2) Public Interest Litigation:
Dhoni’s retirement is quite a buzz, especially amongst foreign media. Post a tragic 3-0 loss to Australia in their den, the No.7 had to answer many retirement-related questions by poky Australian journalists and when asked about his diminishing utility as a leader, Dhoni mocked the critics by saying, “ There will be a conflict of interest if I start reviewing my performance. We would have to put a PIL to judge my performance as the skipper.”This answer was enough to shun a few more questions.
3) DRS needs warranty:
In the initial days of the Decision Review System, the BCCI denied to accept it by admitting that the system wasn’t fully dependable. Gradually the Indian Board did implement in though but this process took time.
When asked to comment about the DRS, Dhoni drew a weird analogy that really made sense. He said, “If I am going to buy a life jacket which does not come with a warranty, that’s a bit of a hassle for me. Especially with the huge amount of money you have to spend on the DRS. I would prefer some kind of warranty for it. The moment it comes, I will be happy.”
4) Rohit Sharma’s edge:
The limited-overs series against Australia has always been considerably tougher for India when compared with other bilateral series. Each wicket and run matters when it’s against Australia, not only because of the win/ lose situation but to also have answers in the post-match media grill conference.
When Dhoni was asked to comment on Rohit Sharma’s wrongly given out decision. He smiled and simply refused to answer in a very polite way. “ I won’t answer that because you didn’t ask me (about luck) when Bailey edged it,” he said.
5) Out of the money:
The Indian team was seen playing football with bare feet ahead of the World T20 semi-finals in 2014. The media picked this point and asked Dhoni the reason for playing football without shoes, as if it was going to make a difference. However, Dhoni didn’t take the question so seriously and answered, “What to do, we are all out of money.”
6) Keep the IPL clean:
After the spot-fixing scandal broke in IPL 2013, Indian cricket was in great doom and some crisis management was needed. However, this topic arose just before the next IPL begun, when Dhoni was asked about the scandal’s effect on the national team and how would he contribute to keeping IPL clean. The Ranchi based cricketer replied with calm. He said, “We will try the laundry, that’s good, will keep us clean.”
7) Liquor’s bitter:
Dhoni has already found trouble once when he advertised a liquor brand. The notion was to not be a role model engaging in acts of alcohol abuse. However, when Dhoni was asked on his take on liquor, although the wicketkeeper-batsman doesn’t consume any, he answered in a diplomatic manner. Dhoni said,“ I find liquor has a bitter taste, so I don’t drink alcohol but understand that other people enjoy it.”
8) Post-retirement plans:
Dhoni has off-lately been surrounded by a lot of questions that point towards his retirement. A similar question about his post-retirement plan got a very quick wit answer from the CSK captain. While talking about his post-retirement plan Dhoni said, “The good thing is that I do collect a lot of stumps but the bad one has I don’t put a mark as to which match they were from. So, after I retire I’ll watch the videos of all my matches, look closely at the sponsor’s logos on the stumps and figure out which match a stump belongs to. It will be my post-cricket pass time!”
9) No Helicopter:
After clinching a stunning victory against Sri Lanka in Ranchi, the journalist casually asked the captain that why was he not playing the helicopter shot so often.
Dhoni didn’t mind answering the question with a brilliant analogy. He said, “See, a helicopter needs a particular place to fly. If you go underwater into a submarine and ask why there are no helicopters there, then that will be a problem. I cannot play it to a bouncer unless I get a stool with me.”
10) Cricket in pop culture:
This one must be the shortest answer in terms of words but M.S.Dhoni successfully described the entire progress of cricket in a sentence. When asked about the transition to a much younger side for the ODI series against Australia after the senior men had played tests, Dhoni said, “From Kishore Kumar, we have gone to Sean Paul.” This reference was very apt and fulfilled many questions.
