Former Indian skipper MS Dhoni is known for his calm demeanour on and off the field, regardless of the situation. It is something that has earned him the nickname 'Captain Cool'.
During his captaincy tenure, Dhoni managed a squad filled with legends such as Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Sourav Ganguly, Virender Sehwag among others. Today’s stars like Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, R Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja also unleashed their potential under his leadership.
With Dhoni at the helm, the Indian team also tasted unpresented success, winning all three ICC white-ball trophies in addition to the Test mace.
There were occasions, however, when Dhoni lost his calm and former CSK batter Subramaniam Badrinath opened up about one such incident from the inaugural IPL season.
“He is also a human…he has lost his cool. But that has never happened on the field. He would never let the opposition know that he has lost his cool. In this match against RCB in Chennai, we were chasing 110 odd. We lost wickets in a cluster there and we ended up losing the match,” Badrinath said while speaking to InsideSport.
Badrinath added that the incident happened after his dismissal to legendary leg-spinner Anil Kumble for just 1. He recalled that Dhoni expressed his anger by kicking a water bottle when he returned to the dressing room and nobody was able to make an eye contact with the then CSK captain.
"I got out to a lap shot against Anil Kumble. I was LBW. So, I was standing inside the dressing room, and he was coming inside, where there was a small water bottle. MS just kicked it out of the park. I was like, 'Shit, oh my god!' Nobody wants to see that. We just couldn’t make eye contact with him. We were all trying to stay away from him. But that was it. He did not say anything. There was no team meeting regarding that," he added.
While MS Dhoni retired from international cricket in 2020, he continues to feature in the Indian Premier League. On the eve of the IPL 2024 opener, he stepped down as CSK captain, handing over the leadership baton to Ruturaj Gaikwad.
Many experts believe that this was Dhoni’s last IPL season, but the 43-year-old has kept his cards close to chest. As per reports, his participation in IPL 2025 season for CSK could depend on number of retentions.
If the number of retained players is five or six, Dhoni could feature in the cash-rich league. In 2018, the franchises were allowed to keep five players for the season, but it was brought down to four in 2022.
