While playing the Indian Premier League (IPL), one of Jos Buttler's biggest thrills has been to observe "big idol" MS Dhoni go about his business. The Chennai Super Kings (CSK) skipper stays calm despite all the weight of expectations and excels under pressure, which is inspiring, said Buttler.
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"MS Dhoni has always been a big idol of mine and chaos is always going around him, people wanting a bit of him, the cricket and the noise," the England and Rajasthan Royals (RR) batsman said in an interview to Lancashire Cricket with Warren Hegg.
"It is such a great lesson to just watch him and see first hand how to manage all that thing if you have to perform at the top level and perform in those crunch moment, that certainly has been one of the massive pluses."
Buttler was due to turn up for the Royals again this year but the IPL 2020 remains suspended because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The 29-year-old, who is also England's limited-overs vice-captain, talked about his biggest lesson from playing the IPL.
“It was one of pressures you have to learn, especially in India, as an oversees players, you are one of the four in the team and you know the other four who are not playing are also world-class players. So you are under pressure to perform," he said.
"So that’s been a great learning curve. One of the things I came out with from the first IPL is to just learn to deal with the chaos."
"There is so much going on off the field, with adverts and stuff that you never done before, meet and greet and different things for different sponsors and then thinking about the game all the time and finding ways to switch off," Buttler added.
Buttler also opined on playing behind closed doors, an idea advocated by many for when cricket could possibly be resumed. "An interesting thought about when cricket returns, if it comes behind closed doors and there is no fans and stuffs, I know that will be really strange for professional cricketers but in a funny sort of way it will take you back to what it was like when you first started," he said.
"There is no one watching you and you are playing because you love the game. I know it will be different because you have experienced the other side of it but that is the most purest form of cricket, isn’t it?"
Everyone wishes to see normalcy return as soon as possible.
"One thing that sports does is it brings people together, give people hope. So hope there can be some form of cricket whether it is behind closed doors, or we play the Blasts, just a little bit of something, it would be great to see the boys on field again even if it is for TV, and get that enjoyment from sport again," Buttler said.
"But sports is not on the top of tree with how things are going on. But fingers crossed, things can turn in the positive way as quickly as they went the other way."
(Inputs from IANS)
