Harbhajan Singh, who announced his retirement from all forms of cricket last year, has often spoken on the lack of support during the second part of MS Dhoni's captaincy tenure. However, he refused to accept there's any rift between him and Dhoni and said they are good friends.
Harbhajan had earlier said that he was backed by former Indian captain Sourav Ganguly as a youngster. But after 2012, he felt there was no support from BCCI or the team management for senior players, unlike Dhoni.
When the ex-India spinner was questioned about his friendship with Dhoni by News 18, he replied, "Very nice. I am not married to him!".
Harbhajan explained his comments on Dhoni on not getting proper backing after 2012, and said, “See, everyone interprets a quote differently. I just wanted to convey that a lot of things could have been better posting 2012. (Virender) Sehwag, me, Yuvraj (Singh), (Gautam) Gambhir could have retired playing for the Indian team since all of them were active in IPL as well.
"It is ironical that the Champions of the 2011 team never played together again! Why? Only a few of them played in the 2015 World Cup, why?".
The 41-year-old has no complaints against Dhoni and he raised questions against BCCI only. “No, not at all. I have no complaints against MS. In fact, he has been a good friend all these years. I have a complaint to the BCCI, the sarkar (government) of that time.
"I call BCCI as sarkar! The selectors of that time didn’t do justice to their roles. They didn’t allow the team to be united," he said.
“What was the point of bringing in new guys when the greats were still around and delivering? I once confronted the selectors on this and their reply was it wasn’t in their hands and then I asked why they are the selectors, then?", he added.
Harbhajan, who made his Test debut in 1998 against Australia in Bangalore, played 103 Tests, taking 417 wickets at an average of 32.46. The offie had said that with the support of the selectors he could have picked over 500 Test wickets.
“Luck has always been in my favor, but some external factors were not in my favor, perhaps they were completely against me, either because of the way I bowled or the way I went forward. I was 31 years old when I took 400 wickets and could have played 4-5 more years,” he had said. "I can tell you that by the standards I set myself, I would have taken 100-150 wickets or more," he added.
(With News 18 Inputs)
