MahiGod! What a shot!

Name: Mahendra Singh Dhoni

Age: 26

Country: India

Category: Sports

Calling: Cricketer

The Beginning

Born on 7^th July, 1981. Dhoni’s parents moved from Uttaranchal to Ranchi, where his father worked as a junior manager. He studied at DAV Jawahar Vidya Mandir, Shyamli, Ranchi, where he was an avid badminton and football player. In fact, it was his football coach who sent him to play cricket matches for a local cricket club. He showed enough promise to be selected for the 1998 Vinoo Mankad Trophy. After a good performance there as well, Dhoni shifted his entire focus on cricket. He was in the tenth standard then.

Rise

After a spate of consistent performances in the Bihar Under-19 squad, Dhoni made his debut at the Ranji Trophy in the 1999-2000 season. He finished the season with 283 runs in 5 matches making his maiden first class century in the very next. He performed well in the next three seasons and was rewarded for his efforts by being selected for the India A squad for a tour of Zimbabwe and Kenya. Despite his back to back centuries and stellar wicket-keeping in the Tri-Nation tournament, Dhoni was overlooked by the ‘ India A’ team coach Sandeep Patil, who recommended Karthik’s name as a wicket-keeper/batsman. He was finally selected in the ODI squad in 2004/2005 for a series against Bangladesh. Despite an ignominious duck in his first match, and an overall poor performance Dhoni was selected for the Pakistan ODI series. In only his fifth ODI, which was also the second match in the series, Dhoni made a brisk 148 in 123 deliveries, which was a record for an Indian wicketkeeper then. In the third ODI of the bilateral series against Sri Lanka, Dhoni helped India chase a stiff target of 299 by scoring 183 runs off just 145 balls, erasing his own record. Pre Twenty20 triumph, Dhoni’s career highlight was dethroning Ricky Ponting from the top of the ICC ODI rankings, though only briefly.

Power-play

Dhoni has won us the World Cup! Hurray! So what if it is only a truncated version of the cup that Kapil got for us in 1983. Though Yuvi stole the limelight because of his downpour of sixes, it was Dhoni who cleverly kept a team of relative newcomers united and motivated, beating the likes of England, Australia, and finally Pakistan in a cliff-hanger. Our power-play? Well, in a surprise move MensXpert has decided to keep the noise about his hairstyle, and his Tendulkarian brand value aside, and instead go for what he’s best at: throwing cricket balls in parking-lots.