David Warner believes MS Dhoni is ‘nurturing’ Virat Kohli’s captaincy
David Warner believes former India skipper MS Dhoni is ‘nurturing’ Virat Kohli, something that is a good thing for both the players.
David Warner believes former captain MS Dhoni’s presence in the Indian side has been of great assistance to Virat Kohli, stating that Dhoni is ‘nurturing’ Kohli as a captain.
MS Dhoni has been a strong force in the Indian team lately, both with the bat as well as behind the stumps. Dhoni has been in a red-hot form with the bat, and his lightning quick stumpings and invaluable feedback to the bowlers has resulted in many a dismissals.
“MS Dhoni brought a sense of calmness to his captaincy. He did a great job as captain and he is still doing a great job, nurturing Virat and that is a great thing to do for a former captain,” the Australian vice-captain was quoted as saying by India Today.
“He is nurturing Virat and that is a good thing to do for both men,” David Warner added.
The Australian side is under a lot of pressure having lost the opening two matches of the ongoing series against India. In both the matches, Australia had seized control but their batsmen have let them down.
On the other hand, the Indian team has been on a roll and their unbeaten streak is now of 11 matches across formats. India won all their nine matches across formats on the tour of Sri Lanka, and have begun the home season with two impressive victories over Australia.
India won the rain-affected first match by 26 runs via Duckworth-Lewis Method at Chennai and the second game in Kolkata by 50 runs, meaning they lead the five-match series 2-0.
However, David Warner has warned Virat Kohli that real pressure will be felt only when his side will lose a few matches.
“Virat has not had a lot of non-success as captain but the real challenge comes when you start losing games. We are here for another three matches to go and hopefully we can turn that around and maybe we will see a different captain,” he added.
The Australian batsman credited the Indian fast bowlers for using the conditions to their benefit early in their second innings. “The ball was swinging and it was challenging conditions. Bhuvi (Bhuvneshwar) and Bumrah bowled brilliantly upfront.
“We lost two early wickets, established a partnership in the middle but did not have that one batsman going on to get a big score,” Warner said.
“We always talked about how if you restrict the Indian team to under 300 in their conditions, you are going a long way to winning the game. We did not get that key partnership in the middle,” he added.
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