You May Be Right In Some Of The Things That You Said In That Blog But Dhoni Can Fast Bowlers As Well As Anyone. It Was Proven When He Made 183 Not Out Vs Sri Lanka In HIs Early Days He Definetly Faced Fast Bowlers In That Match.

Yes he did score 183, but in that match the pace bowlers were Vaas, Maharoof and Fernando. Vaas and Maharoof, who are natural medium pacers had economies of over 7 and over but Fernando only had an economy of 4.75.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni is an over rated indian batsmen that lacks a skill that is a key element if you are to be classified as a world class batsmen. That is having the ability to read and play Fast bowlers well. Bowlers from around the world including Lasith Malinga, Brett lee, Dale Steyn, Chaminda Vaas who are just some of the world classy seamers that Dhoni would have trouble playing. Dhoni maybe at the top of the ICC rankings for one day batsmen yet i do not believe that he deserves that spot. Mr. Senanayake's point are excellent. At last someone has come out an expressed his thoughts on Dhoni and they are perfect!!
well done Mr. Senanayake

I do not completely agree with Messers Ravi and Nandun. Till date Dhoni has not blasted the quickies as often as he has done against spinners and medium pacers, but he has got good record of tearing apart Pakistani attack and that too in Pakistan and the bowlers included Sami, Shoaib, Gul etc all of whom are quite pacy.
And one must not forget that he has been playing role of a finisher for quite some time now a days.
So, you do not need to be a basher to be a better batsman.

Talk about a jealous Sri Lankan fan trying to run down Dhoni. FYI, Dhoni played against the likes of Shoaib Akhtar, Mohammad Sami in Pakistan and did well against them. Your claim of him being unable to play fast bowling is easily destroyed in the light of this revelation. Or should it be enlightenment for you folks.Btw, Lasith Malinga is no quick bowler, neither does his action seem clean. Adam Gilchrist thrashed him all over the place in the World Cup final.

Anyone who saw the India-Pakistan ODI series in November '07 knows that dhoni is very vulnerable against bowlers with genuine pace. His ineptitude against genuine fast bowling was exposed and exploited by Umar Gul and Shoaib Akhtar, unquestionably the two quickest bowlers in asia, who had him dancing around like a ballerina.

This is a flawed argument. I agree it’s a stretch by miles to say M S Dhoni is world’s best ODI batsman. Rankings signify that he has performed consistently for over a period of time (Not considering opposition or conditions). Dhoni did fail in Australia, but so did Dravid who is far superior batsman in his first tour to Australia but did very well in subsequent tours. You cannot term Dhoni a failure for not performing well in one tour. The plaudits are pouring in for Dhoni not because he is the best ODI player but how he is able to transform himself despite his limitations, after assuming captaincy. Look at Mahela, always a great performer at home; for a long time, his average overseas was practically nothing but in last couple of years he is slowly but surely overcoming it. MS Dhoni sure does have problems handling genuine fast bowlers in helpful conditions but my bet is he will find a way to overcome his limitations. That’s what smart, hardworking and talented players do.

What ultimately matters is how effective that player is to help his team winning matches, whether he has done it with playing spinners or seamers is totally immaterial.

Secondly when you are saying coming down gives him any obvious advantage as per your say, you miss the fact that while chasing down the total, he copes against challenging asking run rate so its not go down “face the bowler take your time and play perform and win.”

It doesn’t happen as easily as you made this allegation without any knowledge here

Second thing is making conclusion is so nonsense that he has had barely 6 years of international cricket and has made tours of all nations barely once. So try to make conclusion when player is towards ending of his career.

So be sure of what kind of conclusions you are making and is there any base to it?

And best luck next time.

So he cannot play fast bowling.. so??? At least he does the best with his limited resources. I think that is what counts. He is after all a keeper-batsmen (a #6) and his job is to bat in the middle-order, which he does well. I am not sure what the problem is.
The ICC rankings are based on runs scored. When the more gifted batsmen like Sangakkara score runs, they will move up the ranks!

Let's not forget his hundreds against Pakistan and of course, the brilliant rearguard against England in the first test at Lord's where his resistance against Sidebottom, Anderson and Tremlett saved India from a loss and paved the way for a series win. I don't think it's fair to criticize him for his success against a team with brilliant spinners and failure in one test series against a good pace attack.

I guess we aren't going to talk about Dhoni vs Shoaib in Pakistan, Dhoni vs Steyn in IPL, Dhoni vs the England quickies on a fast track at Lord's, Dhoni vs Malinga & co in Australia etc.

Hey Nandun you are spot on man. But as you say Dhoni is not best technically equipped batsman but he delivers. He delivered as captain, as finisher, as accumulator, as dasher and no batsman in world have done this. Tought India to score 8 run per over with singles and twos as well as 15 rpo with boundries(any batsman can do). There are many batsman who are technically better than Dhoni can play fast and spin bowlers better but are they delivering.

He is the best ODI batsman in the world and the second best Keeper batsman in tests, must be doing something right

If he were sent up the order to open the innings with Sehwag,someone would come up with a post about why India is unnecessarily tinkering with its opening combination.He may not be a good player of pace bowling.So be it.As long as runs are coming and the team is winning,what's our problem?

It's about Dhoni having a weakspot against pace bowling rather than him being a bad batsman. I agree he is a good batsman. Also in this article (which didnt make it to the blog) I said Dhoni is one of the most patient batsman against pace bowlers and I do praise him for that. He reminds me of Sarouv Ganguly in the 03 World Cup who didnt enjoy facing pace bowlers towards that time in his career and publicly announced and tried to take advantage of this, which failed.

Finally if Dhoni can fix his weakness against pace bowling he obviously will be one of the best batsmen in ODI cricket, but atm he isnt.

ok.. lets look at all the comments closely.. wat was the whole point in even bringing out dhoni's weakness supposing it existed.. tel me which team has won tests in all the test playing nations in recent years and it's only because of the balance that any player brings to the team.. as i can see from the names the pakistanis and sri lankans must be aware of how their star performers have fared in the last few years.. as for sri lanka all they can do is prepare the worst of pitches where the cricket is so dull and bring on murali and co.. every damn ground in sri lanka is made for murali.. so my point is its not how a player performs against certain bowling but rather wat he does to the team and how the team fares..

Why are people bothered about whether Dhoni is a world class batsman or not? Why cant we just enjoy the fact that he is only the second Indian captain to win a world cup? He is a good leader, great motivator and a daring captain who could question the commitment of some of his seniors. Sachin also had a few weaknesses in his most celebrated career and so did Sourav and Rahul and so do Yuvi and Sehwag too. But they have given the Indian cricket team some memorable and historic wins at home and overseas. They have fought against their weaknesses and came out successful every time and so would be remembered as legends of Indian Cricket. Anil Kumble is still not a great spinner of the cricket ball, so to say, but the number of wickets he took speaks volumes of his fighting abilities and adaptability. Dhoni has the knack of finding the winning ways, almost always and thats why he stands out as a good captain. Accept that he has a long way to go to become a legend and an altime great captain

Dhoni is a great captain who bats according to the situation and shuffles his batting position accordingly.He is a very responsible and attacking player who is the best when it comes to taking sigles.He batted pretty well in the Idea cup but i think Thilina thushara deserved the man of the series award.

Definitely not. His best ODI scores have come against the best Pace bowling units of Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Also he has a great record outside of India too. He is the best player.

"Talk about a jealous Sri Lankan fan trying to run down Dhoni. FYI, Dhoni played against the likes of Shoaib Akhtar, Mohammad Sami in Pakistan and did well against them. Your claim of him being unable to play fast bowling is easily destroyed in the light of this revelation. Or should it be enlightenment for you folks.Btw, Lasith Malinga is no quick bowler, neither does his action seem clean. Adam Gilchrist thrashed him all over the place in the World Cup final."

Obviously your a little deluded and probably never even bother to read the article 'Indian'. The very fact that you think Lasith Malinga's action is suspect, shows how much (or little) you know about Cricket. The person who wrote the article said Dhoni was vulnerable against pace. Just because he did well against them (IN Pakistan) doesn't make him great against pace. And FYI, at least after the world cup final was lost, our team got home safe and didn't have their homes attacked. Which is more than can be said for your team!

DHONI SUCKS! . . this will be a true statement in couple of years. His weaknesses will be revealed by that time, and he would not be as good as he is now. Look at his test batting average, it is pretty pathetic for the ODI legend. Why . . is that? Well, if you look at it quite close, it is apparent that test teams have fewer spinners than you see in the ODI side, except Sri Lanka . So there you go.
If I am wrong, tell me . . I am happy to hear

Mr Pumudu, regarding your comments.
"The very fact that you think Lasith Malinga's action is suspect, shows how much (or little) you know about Cricket"
I know more about cricket than you do based on your limited exposure to the game in the form of slingshot Malinga. His action is definitely doubtful, not smooth like that of a Chaminda Vaas. My opinion on Malinga's action has no relation to my knowledge of cricket. Or is that your way of reasoning perhaps?
What is amusing is this line of yours "Just because he did well against them (IN Pakistan) doesn't make him great against pace." If Dhoni does well against the Pakistan pace attack, that doesn't make him good against pace?? LOL. Guess you don't consider the Pakistani bowling attack (Shoaib Akhtar and co) to be of any quality then. They're definitely better than your semi round arm action Malinga and spin bowling attack. Your homes attacked comment on our team is a pathetic attempt at a comparision. Nice try though.

It is true that dhoni is not a naturally talented batsman or a wicket-keeper.
Look at his keeping he is one of the safest keepers in the world today. as recently as the tour of england he was consistently called a batter who kept the wickets. the point is that he improved his keeping to the point that he is one of the safest if not the finest behind the stumps.

coming in front of the stumps, he consistently struggled against muralidharan. at that time it was said that he could only play the meduim pacers on true wickets. in the recently concluded 1 day series he not only handled a double challenge of murali and mendis, scored at 5-6 runs an over against both of them.

dhoni is yet to establish himself as a batsman of substance in the test arena. there is enough promise shown in terms of determination that he would do that once he has to lead by example in tests too.
at least everyone would agree that he is one of the most improved batsmen in contemporary cricket, as far as 1dayers go

Dhoni is amazing. You are wrong.