Bangalore's Yelahanka AirForce Station had invited the Indian camp for a visit to their base camp.
Kirsten, India’s 2011 World Cup-winning coach recalled an instance when Dhoni canceled a team trip to Bangalore’s Yelahanka AirForce Station, despite receiving invitation to visit their base camp.
The camp’s ‘Indians only’ policy proved to be the deal-breaker for Dhoni as the Indian team had the likes of Paddy Upton and Eric Simmons in support staff apart from Kirsten. Understanding the precarious position, Dhoni took no time in calling off the trip for the entire team.
“I’ve said on many occasions, he’s one of the most impressive people I’ve met. He’s a great leader of people, he’s got an incredible presence as a leader, but I think he’s loyal, and that’s the most important thing. I’ll never forget, just before the World Cup, we were invited to Bangalore to go to the flight school, to go and kind of have a look at that,” Kirsten told commentator Radhakrishnan Sreenivasan, during his YouTube show The RK Show.
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“So MS canceled the whole event. He just said, ‘These are my people. If they’re not allowed in, none of us are going’. And that was what he was about,” Kirsten added.
The South African was really fond of Dhoni during that entire tenure and now, as he revealed, the appreciation was actually mutual.
“He was very loyal to me, and I think he saw it as well. There were times when we didn’t always win games and we’d have some tough times. We’d spend a lot of time, just one on one together, talking through, taking the team forward. I think we built a strong relationship in the three years we had together,” Kirsten signed off.