Former India player turned commentator Sanjay Manjrekar praised MS Dhoni for his decision to promote himself over Ravindra Jadeja against Delhi Capitals (DC). He did this to keep the left-hand right-hand combination well in the middle.

And, the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) captain did well while coming into bat at No.7. While many thought Ravindra Jadeja to come out, Dhoni’s entry was a bit shocker for everyone at that stage as he has been going through a poor form. Dhoni has managed to hit three boundaries and six out of the six deliveries he had faced to take CSK into their ninth IPL final as well.

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Manjrekar praised Dhoni while speaking to ESPN Cricinfo: “This is his greatness, he has played so many innings like this, where there is so much risk if things don’t go as intended. Coming into such a situation, at this stage if his career is truly a sign of his greatness. See, he had to maintain the left hand-right hand combination, but if you see in the eight handers, there was Bravo as an option. But he went the right way, if you compare the batting of both Dhoni and Bravo, I still feel that Dhoni is the better batsman.”

However, all of MS Dhoni’s boundaries came on the leg side. While his six off Avesh Khan in the 19th over was on the longer side of the ground, he smashed Tom Curran on the leg side. And, Manjrekar gave the example of the 2011 World Cup final where Dhoni promoted himself ahead of Yuvraj Singh to keep the left-hand right-hand combination intact with Gautam Gambhir in the middle.

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He further added: “If you remember, he did this in the 2011 World Cup as well. He promoted himself to maintain the left hand-right hand partnership, because Muralidaran had 8 overs remaining.”