Mahendra Singh Dhoni

Mahendra Singh Dhoni is a cricketer from India who is the captain, wicket-keeper and middle order batsman of Indian National Cricket Team. He entered the National team in 2004 when India lacked a consistent wicket keeper batsman and quickly became popular because of his aggressive batting.

Following his great performances as a batsman, he was appointed as the captain of Indian team for the debut Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa in which India won the cup as well. After Dravid’s resignation from ODI captaincy and Kumble’s retirement from Test cricket, MS Dhoni became the captain of Indian team in all the three forms of the game. Due to his popularity, many companies have selected him as the brand ambassador for their products and he is currently one of the highest earning cricketers in the world.

On April 25, 2010, Chennai Super Kings led by MS Dhoni won the third edition of Indian Premier League by beating Mumbai Indians in the final match by 22 runs.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni made his international debut in 2004 in the first ODI of India in Bangladesh ODI series. He was unfortunate to be run out on duck in his debut, but scored a brilliant 123-ball 148 against Pakistan in his fifth ODI. He scored his first Test fifty in his second Test match and thereafter he played consistently well in both ODIs and Tests.

The most remarkable performance by Dhoni was during the "Sri Lanka in India ODI series" in 2005 when he scored an unbeaten 183 runs while chasing a target of 299. It is the highest score by any wicket keeper in ODI matches and it is the third highest score by an Indian in ODI matches. He also won Man of the series in that 7-match ODI series.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni was born on July 7, 1981 to Pan Singh and Devki Devi in Ranchi, Jharkhand. He has a brother Nahendra and a sister Jayanti. During his school days, Dhoni was good at football and badminton and he was selected for the district team in both the sports. However, he left both the sports and started playing cricket for a local club as asked by his football instructor K.R. Banerjee.

He was the goal keeper in football team and so he preferred wicket keeping in cricket. Later, he became the regular wicket keeper of the club team. Being good in club level matches, he was selected for the Vinoo Mankad Under-16 tournament in 1997- 98 and he performed well in the tournament. Eventually, he was selected for Bihar to play in 1999-2000 season of Ranji Trophy and it took another 5 five years for him to be selected for the National squad.http://www.dhoni.org/main.aspx