Chennai, Feb 27: With the eight-wicket win over Australia on Tuesday MS Dhoni equalled the Sourav Ganguly’s record for most number of Test wins – 21 – by an Indian captain. But typical of the man, Dhoni was more chuffed with the fact that he played an innings that helped the team score a big win.
Excerpts:
On how he faced recent spate of criticisms: What really matters is the job that I am trying to do – and the best thing that I have done is not to watch television or read newspapers. But it’s not like I don’t l read newspapers. The third page from behind is the sports page, so you try to get rid of it because otherwise you don’t know what’s happening in India.
On the difference between his Nagpur innings (99) and the double hundred at Chennai: I played the two innings differently – the demands were very different. What was needed in the Nagpur Test was very different to what was needed in this Test match because this game was evenly poised here, and Nathan (Lyon) was bowling well. It was important that you got rid of that extra catching fielder around you. And it worked well here.
On whether he likes to continue at No 6: To dig a well you have to dig the first foot first, you can’t dig the fiftieth foot first. So let’s play in this series first, we’ll think about later when it comes.
On how special the double hundred was: I don’t have many big innings. So it’s slightly easy for me to choose. I feel the 70 runs that I scored at Lord’s in the 2007 series was very special because that innings really helped us win that series. It’s not the amount of runs, often it is the weightage of the innings that matters. Yes, it was a different innings, special for me.
On Ashwin’s bowling: Yes, he bowled really well. We all need to respect the fact that he is someone who has got a lot of variations and that’s his strength. He has always been very consistent with his length, and this is the period he was not so consistent with his length and it was important for him to come back and I’m glad that in this particular Test match he bowled a very good length.
On Harbhajan Singh’s bowling: I think he bowled really well and also at times if two spinners of the same category are playing, one can be intimidated by the fact that the other bowler is coming to bowl to push me out. Bhajji was a bit tentative in the first innings but he came back very strongly and was very consistent with his length in the second innings.
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