One of the most coveted wickets that a bowler can take in today’s game is that of former Indian captain MS Dhoni. The wicketkeeper-batsman has the ability to take the game away from an opposition and this has made them very wary of his abilities.
In the fourth ODI against the Australians at Bangalore, Dhoni was expected to help India get to the finish line, but he fell at a crucial time to Kane Richardson. Later on, the bowler revealed that getting his wicket was always planned.
Steve Smith’s guidance:
Richardson revealed that captain Smith was the one who advised him to bowl in the right areas to Dhoni. Due to Smith’s experience having played with Dhoni in the IPL, he was able to tell Richardson what was the best plan.
“Yeah.. umm it was down to the wire, but 40 of 3 overs sounds like a lot, as a batting team you can chase it down quite easily in this day and age. So it was just keeping our plans what Smithy wanted and it was nice when the captain tells you what to do, so you just go about and try to execute that as best as you can,” Kane Richardson was quoted as saying by Cricket Addictor.
Richardson revealed that having Smith advise him helped him release some of the pressure. He said that he hadn’t bowled to Dhoni in the death overs but due to Smith’s captaincy, he was absolutely fine doing so.
He said that getting 40 runs in just 3 overs was not a big task in today’s day and age but he was happy that he was able to get the big fish out.
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“I haven’t experienced bowling to him at the death before.I’ve played against him a little bit in IPL but I haven’t managed to bowl to him in the end so it is nerve wrecking coz you have your plans in the meeting and the plan is to never put it in his arc pretty much and pace on the ball is a bad thing, so as I said Smithy knows him pretty well, so he just come up and said look do this and all you can do is try your best and luckily last night things worked out,” Kane Richardson added.
