In the recently announced Indian squad for the two back-to-back T20I series, former Indian skipper MS Dhoni hasn’t been included. While it was a little bit surprising but it was not a much-unexpected decision, according to the present circumstances. Now the big question is, what is the future of MS Dhoni in international cricket?
After completing the ongoing five-match home ODI series against Windies, India will play a three-match home T20I series against Windies and then another three-match away T20I series against the hosts Australia. Indian present limited-overs wicketkeeper-batsman and the former World Cup & World T20 winning skipper MS Dhoni hasn’t been included in both the shorter format squads.
In the response of team selections, most people believed that it might be the ending path for MS Dhoni in his T20I career. However, the selection committee Chief selector MSK Prasad claimed that it is not an ending sign for MS Dhoni in T20I.
MSK Prasad said, “He [Dhoni] is not going to be play the six T20Is [West Indies and Australia] because we are looking at the second keeper’s slot. So I think we will retain Rishabh [Pant] and Dinesh Karthik. So they will be getting a chance to keep and bat.”
However, Dhoni’s T20I future is still under question as his presence in international cricket till the next ICC World T20 in Australia in October-November 2020 is still in serious doubt. A senior BCCI official has lightened about this while he also added that this decision was taken under Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma’s presence in the meeting.
That official told PTI, “It’s a given that Dhoni won’t be around when next ICC World T20 happens in Australia in 2020. So, there wasn’t any point continuing with him if he will not play World T20.
“Obviously, the selectors and team management had a good deliberation on this issue. Both Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma were present at the selection committee meeting. You think selectors could have gone ahead without their approval?”
The questions over MS Dhoni’s international career are rising since he decided to not play for Jharkhand in the knock-out stages of the recent Vijay Hazare Trophy. However, the Jharkhand coach Rajiv Kumar clarified about this with the logical reason as the former Indian captain didn’t want to break the perfect team balance in the middle of a tournament.
However, Dhoni’s recent struggling batting form has also raised the concern on his international cricket future. If Rishabh Pant clicks in this situation, Dhoni’s future for the 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup might come in danger. However, his fitness is still enough well for the international cricket level as he is still master in the wicketkeeping or to help the team with his powerful leadership experiences.
