Veteran spinner Ravichandran Ashwin hailed MS Dhoni’s exceptional leadership qualities and credited him for transforming Chennai Super Kings (CSK) under his captaincy. Ashwin had a breakthrough season for CSK under Dhoni in 2010 and there has been no looking back for the off-spinner since as he remains one of the best spinners in the country at the moment.
Ashwin spent seven seasons at CSK under Dhoni before moving to the now-defunct Rising Pune Supergiant – where he played under the veteran wicket-keeper batsman for two years.
“I know a lot over the years, in terms of how CSK has come through, how MS has transformed the whole franchise and what it means to him,” Ashwin told Harsha Bhogle on Cricbuzz live.
“For me, CSK is a team that was driven by MS’ leadership traits. A lot of people talk about MS’ leadership. My leadership in itself is what is going to come out of me having been a leader in the last couple of years,” he added.
After praising Dhoni’s leadership, Ashwin was quick to point how the CSK skipper has been immensely successful as a middle-order batsman in the IPL and has bailed his team out of trouble on numerous occasions. Ashwin said Dhoni’s middle-order batsmanship is not talked about enough. Dhoni has scored 3309 runs in IPL batting at number four and five.
“It think MS’s middle-order batsmanship is not talked about enough. In franchise cricket, or T20 cricket or any format of white-ball cricket, the most difficult art to master is middle-order batsmanship. A leader inspires a team by pulling them out from deep trenches, MS has done it way too many more times than anybody I have seen,” said Ashwin.
