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Dhoni stepped out to bat at No. 5 for India in the 2011 ODI World Cup final against Sri Lanka at Wankhede Stadium and remained unbeaten on 91 runs from 79 balls.
MS Dhoni came out to bat ahead of Yuvraj Singh in the 2011 ODI World Cup final against Sri Lanka. (Picture Credit: AFP)
MS Dhoni came out to bat at No. 5 for India in the 2011 ODI World Cup final, which was played against Sri Lanka at Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on April 2, 2011, and remained unbeaten on 91 runs from 79 balls. Dhoni, who was leading India in that tournament, added 109 runs for the fourth wicket with Gautam Gambhir (97 runs from 122 balls) and 54 for the fifth wicket with Yuvraj Singh (21 not out from 24 balls) to help India successfully chase down the target of 275 runs in 48.2 overs and win the ODI World Cup final by six wickets.
Dhoni’s promotion in the batting order ahead of in-form Yuvraj came as a surprise for many fans at that time, and now finally Dhoni has explained the reason behind taking that decision.
In a video going viral on the internet from a recent event, Dhoni opened up about the decision to come ahead of Yuvraj in the final and said that he wanted to go because of the presence of three off-spinners in Sri Lanka’s playing XI, two of whom were his former teammates at Chennai Super Kings.
“Gautam (Gambhir) and Virat (Kohli) had a very good partnership, and Yuvraj was in form. Yuvi was having a very good World Cup. So, the tricky decision was whether Yuvi should go in or, you know, I wanted to… there was something in me; I wanted to go,” Dhoni said.
“The reason was simple; it was very experience-driven. If you look at the (Sri Lankan) bowling at that time, the bowlers who were going to bowl in the middle overs. Murli sir (Muralitharan) was there, Suraj Randiv was there, and (Tillakaratne) Dilshan was there in the part-timers, all three of them off-spinners. And two of the three off-spinners had played for CSK. So, Murli sir was with CSK, Suraj Randiv was with CSK, which meant that I had batted them a lot in nets. And it is said that it becomes a little easier to play off spinners for righties (right-handed batters),” he continued.
“Gautam was already there, you know, and Gautam and I have not batted very much together. But we have batted, especially when we went to play India A in Kenya and Zimbabwe. In the one-day tournament in Kenya, I was batting up the order. So, we batted a lot together at that time. So, we run very well between the wickets, and it was needed at that point of time. And I felt that the left-right combination and the way I had played Suraj Randiv and Muralitharan, because of that, it will be a little easier if I bat well in the starting 2-4 overs,” Dhoni added.
For his super show with the bat in the title decider, Dhoni won Player of the Match award, and he also finished the match with a six on the second ball of the 49th over of the run chase.
