Dhoni gets Kohli’s unflinching support

kingston — India skipper Virat Kohli has extended his predecessor Mahendra Singh Dhoni unflinching support amid a gradually growing chorus of calls for his retirement from international cricket.

Kohli spoke warmly about India’s most successful cricket captain hours before he turned 36, while giving cold shoulder to those calling for his retirement.

“He is striking the ball beautifully, you don’t need to tell him anything in terms of how to play a situation, how to build an innings,” Kohli said of Dhoni after India wrapped up the five-match ODI series in the West Indies 3-1.

While he carved out a brisk 78 in the third one-dayer, Dhoni struggled to get going in the next game, scoring a 54 off 114 balls, an aberration in a career marked by explosive batting.

Kohli sought to defend the man he replaced, one by one, in all formats.

When a scribe told Dhoni was not his usual self at one of the nets, Kohli responded, “You have to figure out what kind of wickets you are playing on as well. I was trying to hit the spinners a couple of days in practice and I couldn’t because the wickets were not that great to play strokes, the wicket in the centre was much better.

“You can’t really judge a guy’s batting form at practice because you don’t know what kind of wickets you are going to get.”

Kohli used a bit of the game’s nuances as way of explanation.

“If the bounce is not ideal then obviously you have to keep defending the ball and keep rotating the strike. I think it was only in the last game he couldn’t rotate the strike and before that he got a brilliant 70 or 80 odd not out.”

The Indian captain said he is “delighted” to have found players like Hardik Pandya and Kedar Jadhav for the sheer explosiveness they bring to the team’s lower-order batting.

Contrary to expectations, Kohli did not experiment much in the five-match ODI series against ninth-ranked West Indies.

“You can’t take any series lightly. You can’t make a Hardik or Kedar bat at No. 3 and 4 and make your top-order batsman bat lower down.

“It’s still international cricket and you have to be respectful towards oppositions and whatever games that you play and it’s very important to understand what works for you as a team and you’ve got to keep sticking to it,” Kohli said. “We keep giving them confidence and both guys are very eager to make dents and we’re very confident of their abilities.” — PTI