A tall, dusky keeper was chosen for the ODI series in Bangladesh. His debut series was nothing special. Still he was retained for the home series against Pakistan, and in the second ODI he blasted 148 against the Pakistani quickies. That was MS Dhoni.

Now there came a huge change. A tall, dusky keeper was chosen for the ODI series in Bangladesh. From which place did he come? This question would be really puzzling then. He came from a small town named Ranchi. His debut series was nothing special. Still he was retained for the home series against Pakistan. Now there was a semi Tsunami in the second ODI. Promoted at number 3, this man blasted 148 against the Pakistani quickies. Yes, this was the arrival of a star, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, aka Mahi or MSD.

After that we saw several explosions from this keeper-batsman. In the home series against Sri Lamka, where Sourav Ganguly was dropped, this man fired the Lankans aside. He never made the absence of Ganguly felt. In the series, he made some records. He fired 183 while chasing 300 breaking the record of maximum sixes by an Indian and breaking Adam Gilchrist’s record of highest score by a keeper. Till then Virender Sehwag was India’a biggest hitter. But now it was Dhoni. But Dhoni is radically different from Viru in his approach. Dhoni unlike Sehwag is calm and cool in the beginning and then starts firing. Also, unlike his senior team mate, Dhoni doesn’t throw his wicket away after settling in. But there are some similarities between the two. Critics had written their techniques but ultimately both shut their mouths by playing good innings.

Soon he became the permanent member of the test team. So, finally India’s search for a keeper batsman ended. But this was not all. After the disappointed World Cup campaign in West Indies, everything went haywire. Dhoni too flopped badly in the tournament. Greg Chappel quit as Indian coach. After the Bangladesh series, India traveled to England and won the test series but lost the limited over series by 4-3. By now he had become vice-captain of the team.

Now came the real turning point of his career and probably Indian cricket also. There is going to be shortest format game’s World Cup. Many had written of the 20-20 format of the game. Dhoni was named as the captain of the young team which was considered to be outsider in the tournament given the experience in this format. Few had expected India to perform well. But the creator of destiny had some other things in his mind. There were many such evidences which prove this.

India’s first match against the Scottish was cancelled due to rain while Pakistan won their match against Scotland convincingly. So, now India just had to avoid defeat by huge margin but still a victory against the arch rival is always an added advantage. So the match started and ended in a tie which meant there would be bowl out like football. There MSD completely outdid his counterpart Shoaib Malik. Mahi surprised everyone with his choice of bowlers in the bowl out. Robin Utthappa never bowled in international match, Virender Sehwag also didn’t bowl in that match either. While the Pakistan captain chose all the frontline bowlers of that match, most of them being fast bowlers. Afterwards we saw how the fast bowlers struggled with short run-ups while the Indian slow bowlers hit the bull’s eye.

Being the topper of Group-D India lost their very fast match in the next stage to the Kiwis. Thanks to mainly Yuvraj’s six sixes against England and Rohit Sharma in the match against South Africa, India reached the semis. There the encounter was against the number one side in the world Australia. Few thought India could win. Ravi Shastri pointed out the Aussies had the edge. But at the end of the match the result was something else. This became the first instance where Australia lost a World Cup semi final. On the other hand Pakistan defeated New Zealand to make the other finalist.

So the mother of all the rivalries started. India vs Pakistan final. The two teams that were eliminated in the first round of the ODI World Cup, made to the final. Given India’s track record against the arch rivals in the World Cup, India surely had the edge. But nothing can be taken for granted. The match started and was fiery. Pakistan needing 13 off the last over. Harbhajan went for plenty in last few overs and Misbah looked in awesome touch. So Mahi had to choose between inexperienced Joginder and Bhajji. Dhoni took the risk of going for the inexperienced Joginder. Joginder started with a big wide and thus runs required becomes 12 off 6. The the calm cool Dhoni walked up to Joginder and gave some suggestion. But then the required runs came down to 6 off 4. Yet Dhoni’s body language was as cool as ice. The rest is history. After few moments we saw men in blue lifting the trophy. This started the new era of Indian cricket.

This was the starting of Dhoni’s reign. He also got the job ODI captaincy. The next big feather in his cap was in Australia. India had just concluded the controversial test series. India lost it by 2-1 due to many factors. So the pressure was completely on India. Then Dhoni gave a big shock to the country. Two of the most experienced players Dravid and Ganguly were excluded for the youngsters which resulted in protests.