When MS Dhoni sealed a place in the Indian team he made sure the position gets hard to snatch away from him. There were a lot of contenders for the wicket-keeper spot but Dhoni's performance kept making it tough for them. 

Parthiv Patel, who was also in queue of the wicket-keepers, talked about the time when Dhoni left them competing for the second choice wicket-keeper spot.

Parthiv made his Test debut for India much before Dhoni in 2002. But he had to make way because of inconsistent performances especially with the gloves. 

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The 35-year-old was a teenager during his first appearance for Team India, and it was the then India coach John Wright who helped him.

"He was always helpful. I remember the first time we had a practice session at Lord's. He took me aside and said 'I have heard good things about you'. He had not seen me play," Parthiv said.

"He told me 'Just go out there and enjoy playing for India and learn from this experience. We have some great players in this team, so just learn from them and have fun.'

"John helped me a lot through the years. I still stay in touch with him. My relationship with him is still strong; I still talk to him on the phone."

The southpaw then talked about Dhoni's arrival and how it gave the other wicket-keeper batsmen a hard time.

"You had to accept the fact and accept the present situation; there was no running away from it.

"At that point of time, the situation was that Dhoni was the captain and everyone else was battling for the second wicket-keeper's slot. I had accepted it. After getting dropped I decided to set myself a certain standard, set myself a certain amount of intensity with which I would play my cricket.

"Be it club cricket, be it Ranji Trophy, be it district cricket, be it the IPL or whatever level it is, I was going to play with a certain amount of intensity. I was going to enjoy it, the level didn't matter to me," he added.

(WITH CRICKETNEXT INPUTS)