Virat Kohli Praises MS Dhoni & Manish Pandey Despite 2nd T20 Loss Against South Africa
The Men in Blue would have loved to seal the series by winning the second T20I but the hosts had perfect plans to stop them. However, with the help of Klaasen’s brilliant innings, South Africa managed to put a break to team India’s winning streak.
Possibly, for the first time in this tour, India’s middle order outshined the top order. As the top order failed to score big, the middle order batsmen Manish Pandey and MS Dhoni took up the responsibility and roared against the Proteas. For quite some time, former India captain MS Dhoni was under the scrutiny for his rather circumspect approach in Twenty-20 internationals.
However, it all changed during the second T20I in Centurion. The wicket-keeper batsman wreaked havoc with a quick fire 52 off 28 balls whereas Manish scored an unbeaten 79 off 48 balls. It was a vintage Dhoni, who played some of his trademark shots to notch up his second fifty in the shortest format.
As the duo gave fans entertainment worth their money, in one of the rare moments, Dhoni was seen losing his cool at Pandey. The incident happened in final over of India’s innings when Dhoni was at the crease. After the first ball, Dhoni was seen yelling at Pandey, asking him to focus towards him and not look elsewhere.
He is heard using cuss words to call Manish Pandey and is apparently scolding him too. The stump mic clearly caught Dhoni shouting, “Oye! Bho*&I$# Idhar dekh le. Udhar kya dekh Raha hai?!”
Really is that you #Dhoni ? 😂 #SAvIND #INDvSA #manishpandey pic.twitter.com/RuvCehOTV6
— PATRIOT 🇮🇳 (@iamchetss) February 21, 2018
When Manish was asked about the incident and his reaction to it, he said, “Mahi woke up. There was his chance. He is probably the best when he bats lower down the order. In the last couple of overs, he looks to dominate and he has done that a number of times.”
Speaking at the presentation ceremony after India’s 6-wicket defeat in Centurion T20I, skipper Virat Kohli was in all praise for the dynamic duo of Dhoni and Manish.
“Tough one for the bowlers. We were looking at 175 with the loss of early wickets. Manish and Raina batted well initially. Manish and MS were outstanding to get to 190. I thought that was a winning total. But the constant drizzle made it difficult from the 12th over onwards. Credit to the SA batsmen. Klaasen and Duminy really batted well,” quoted Kohli.
“They were very positive. Good from the spectator point of view. You don’t want the play to be stopped. Once the game was continued in the first innings, we knew it was going to be continued throughout. You don’t mind these things. We didn’t have problems with that. There was a constant drizzle, wasn’t too drastic at any stage. It was fine to play in. Not just the case with the short boundary, the ball travels here anyway,” he added.
When asked about Dhoni losing cool in the middle, Virat said ‘It is common when a player is under pressure and he didn’t mean any offense,’ a source close said.
Virat also defended his bowlers saying that it was difficult to grip the ball because of the constant drizzle. “With the drizzle, the wicket settled down. The ball was difficult to grip too. They took calculated risks. They targeted the short boundary and it came off for them. They deserve to win. We expect them to show some fight. They showed the passion which is needed to win games of cricket. They deserved to win tonight,” the Indian captain said.