They say, Where has the ‘Midas Touch’ gone!

           Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the captain of Indian cricket team. A team which was asked to bring home the Cup that matters. Since the time the world cup team was announced, there were questions regarding the ability of few players. Even though the team played pretty decent in the first few games of the contest, but they were not able to make a convincing win against their opponents, be it small team or big teams. 

           The last match of India against South Africa was a disaster according to more than half the population of our country (even me). It was right to some extent. But was it completely fair to blame Dhoni all alone for what had happen? I mean whatever decision he took of giving the last over to Ashish Nehra was kind of a gambling that didn’t work in our favour.

           I personally fell that Mahendra Singh Dhoni is bit of a gambler. He is a captain who takes chance in the critical stage of the game. Some times it works some times it doesn’t. But when it works we praise the captain like crazy. We appreciate his strategies,

we only talk good about the change in the batting order that he had made. Why? Simply because that change made the country win.

           For example, in the T20 World Cup finals, the last over was given to Joginder Sharma. As soon as Dhoni gave the ball in Joginder Sharma’s hand, many people watching & supporting India worldwide started commenting on his decision(obliviously the comments were too bad & I was one of them). But as soon as Misbah-Ul –Haq made a blunder by playing a scoop shot & Sreesanth standing at short fine leg caught him (I guess the only good thing in Sreesanth’s career so far), everyone started celebrating. After we brought the T20 cup home, there were talks about how good Dhoni is as a captain & how his decision to give the bowling to Joginder Sharma was absolutely right.

             There are more than a few times where Dhoni has taken a risk at a critical situation in the game and his decision has turned the match in our favour. There was one time when any and every change that he made, be it in batting order or bowling order, had made wonders to our team. At that time we were the one who praised him and his leadership qualities. And now because of his one single wrong decision he has to face the music. I mean yes he has to, being the captain. But to this extent!! I am not supporting Dhoni here. I am not even his great fan. But I like him as a captain. If we praise him in his good times then it’s our responsibility to support him in bad ones.

           My only point of matter here is that, why can’t we just accept a defeat??  I know cricket is not just a game in India. It’s a religion. But still. Is this behaviour fair towards the players? Anyways the players are playing under immense pressure. And by putting cricketers posters on fire and throwing stones at their houses we are just mounting more pressure on our players.

            We need to accept the fact that it’s a game. Some one has to win and some one has to loose (that applies to me as well). That’s the problem of our people. If a player is performing incredibly well they will cross their limits to praise him and shower their love on him. But unfortunately if a player doesn’t perform well, they can make him feel that he is the worst player in this entire world. And we have done it to even Sachin Tendulkar, when he was in a bad form. When Sachin scores a century, he is GOD,But when he is out on duck for more than two times consecutively, he is no more that great player, its time for him to retire from the game. Observe the double standards we carry.

             Anyways, I guess its high time that Team India should pull up their socks and push themselves to the extreme to perform and live upto the country’s expectations. It’s not too late. And it’s our duty or rather responsibility to support our team in victory and especially in defeat. I am sure we don’t want our Midas to loose his touch

Come on India!! De Ghooma ke…