My favourite MS Dhoni, the captain, moment

Akash Sarkar - When Dhoni pulled a rabbit out of his hat

When things boiled down the last over in the final of the World T20 in 2007, that was the first instance when we saw Dhoni - the captain, the gambler. He had two choices at his disposal. Either hand the inexperienced Joginder Sharma the ball or go with Harbhajan Singh.

Dhoni trusted the medium pacer and though things got a little tight in the end, Misbah-ul-Haq played that scoop shot which landed in S Sreesanth's hands to give India the title by five runs.

"I thought if a medium pacer bowls it would be slightly difficult since Misbah was timing it very well against Harbhajan, who was also not 100% sure about his yorkers. And Joginder had had a decent spell till in the match, so I decided to go with him," he explained later.

The decision clicked and rest is history. India became champions of the inaugural World T20 but one thing is for sure, even if they hadn't, Dhoni would have taken the bullet. That was the day we got a glimpse of Dhoni the maverick captain.

Aayush Puthran - Dhoni, the risk-taker

In a rain-marred and shortened final, hosts England needed 130 runs in 20 overs to win the 2013 Champions Trophy. Eoin Morgan and Ravi Bopara's well-paced partnership ensured that the requirement had come down to 28 from the last three overs, with two overs of powerplay still remaining. England retained the powerplay overs to the last two. Dhoni had four frontline bowlers at his disposal - Ishant Sharma, Umesh Yadav, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Ravindra Jadeja. Two erratic pacer and two spinners. Who does he go for? Ishant, the most expensive of the bowlers, was handed the responsibility of bowling the 18th.

The lanky pacer started off with a dot, was then hammered for a six and followed it up with two wide deliveries. The required runs came down to 20 from 16. Dhoni, nonetheless, maintained a picture of calm even as the decision of handing the ball to Ishant got criticised in front of TV sets and on social media platforms. He knew none of it in the middle, and had flirted with pressure situations way too often to believe that he could triumph, again. Like so many times in the past, and in years to come, only he knew what the plan was all about. Baffling to many, maybe even the opposition captain, but that is what had always been Dhoni's USP. If not for his post-match explanations, maybe none of it would have made sense.

As it turned out, Ishant dismissed both the batsmen off consecutive deliveries, conceded only a single and broke England's momentum by the time the over gets done.

With two overs to go, England eventually took the powerplay. The two pacers and the two spinners had been fairly economical. Thus, the natural conclusion was that Bhuvneshwar and Umesh would bowl the last two overs. But Dhoni went on to defy conventional logic, again. Jadeja zipped past the 19th in no time, bowling flat. Jos Buttler was bowled and Tim Bresnana was run out.

Needing 12 off the last over, Dhoni handed over the ball to Ashwin. He started off with a dot, but a low fulltoss off the second ball was swiped for a boundary by Stuart Broad. England collected ones and twos and brought down the demand to six off the last delivery. Ashwin foxed James Tredwell by the lack of pace, while the batsman went for a slog. Dhoni failed to collect it behind the stumps, but in a rare display of emotion, he jumped at his spot and fist pumped the air before uprooting a stump.

In the post-match presentation, he went on to explain the logic behind the decision of bowling spinners in the last two powerplay overs. "It's important to be positive. I said 'we are the No. 1-ranked team, let's play like that'. I knew the two overs of powerplay were crucial. I wanted to make them slog off the spinners. They all handled the pressure really well, in international cricket people talk about technique but it's the ones that deal with the pressure."

When it came to pressure on the field, no one handled it better!

Shirshendu Roy - M S Dhoni - The Selfless Giver

In India's quest to enter their second final of a Twenty20 World Cup, Virat Kohli had already become the T20 giant that we all know of now, and his scintillating knock had nothing but assured India of a triumph over South Africa in a demanding run-chase in the semifinal of 2014.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni and his fairy-like tales of being the finisher were already a part of the folklore and when he took strike for the first time on the final ball of the penultimate over, India's scores were levelled. Beuran Hendricks bowled the most harmless slower, short ball that the skipper could have muscled to any part of the park, and the Mirpur crowd would have hoped for nothing different.

Against the popular belief, Dhoni quietly blocked it, taking the game into yet another final over, but for reasons different this time. India's poster boy, Kohli was on 68 and had masterminded another chase, and while the best of storytellers wanted Dhoni to wallop to another magic-like finish, he passed the magic wand to his would-be successor.

Kohli, like the rest of the world, was taken aback and he finished off in style, off the first ball of the last over. But the wink of an eye, and a child-like smile had yet again revealed the giver in Dhoni. It takes a lot of you when you are the captain, a lot more when you have to be selfless at it. What makes Dhoni special is it actually doesn't take much of him to do so, it comes as naturally to him, as another six to finish would have. Thank you, MS - the selfless giver.

Vishaal Loganathan - The perfect goodbyes

What's Indian cricket without homage to the seniors and superstars? MS Dhoni understood Indian cricket like no one else, and he understood how to treat its superstars the same way too.

When it was time for one of India's greatest captains to step down from the game, MS Dhoni offered Sourav Ganguly one of the most memorable farewells by asking him to take over captaincy during the final stages of the Test against Australia in Nagpur in 2008.

Ganguly was asked to take over the reins with Australia nine down, and he led the side for a few overs. It was a move that drew great admiration and accolades for Dhoni, but that was only the beginning.

When he was to receive the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, Dhoni invited Anil Kumble, who was the India captain at the start of the series but was forced into retirement due to a shoulder injury, onto the stage to jointly receive the trophy.

Such a special reaction to a legend stepping away was once again on view in 2013. MS Dhoni and his team formed a special revolving guard of honour for Indian cricket's greatest hero, with Sachin Tendulkar even breaking down at the very end.

It spoke volumes of Dhoni's humility and awareness. He had not only led India to a win over their rivals, but had also ensured three of Indian cricket's biggest legends got their due farewells.

Prakash Govindasreenivasan - MSD, The Great Gambler

There's something exciting about a ballsy gamble. More so, about one in such an incredibly high-stakes match. The team selection had already ruffled quite a lot of feathers and set raging debates in motion, but the collective sighing of disapproval hit crescendo when he decided to walk out to bat ahead of Yuvraj Singh in the nervy run chase of the 2011 World Cup final. The same Yuvraj who was in the form of his life, all through the tournament.

This Dhoni decision unfurled a flurry of thoughts - the last time he pulled a rabbit out of his hat, in the form of Joginder Sharma's 20th over, he won India a world title. But, the ordeal ahead this time around, rendered such optimism-based statistics worthless. Here, in the centre of a deafening Wankhede stadium, the task was herculean. The move, it was later known, was backed by solid cricketing reason - of shielding Yuvraj from two off-spinners - Muralitharan and Suraj Randiv. And yet, the thought of tinkering with a settled line-up at such a crucial moment of the game needed a serious sense of self backing, specially in a tournament when runs rarely came off his blade.

I took a quite few decisions tonight, if we hadn't won I would have been asked quite a few questions: Why no Ashwin, Why Sreesanth. Why no Yuvraj, Why did I bat ahead?!

There was no need for answers, for he sealed it like only he could. The six off Kulasekara remains etched in the memory of thousands who witnessed it on that night, but that he'd pulled it off with such a massive mental baggage, summed up all the years of his deservedly-decorated leadership.

Kaushik Rangarajan - Leadership 101

My favourite Dhoni, the captain, moment actually comes from a game when his decision making came under immense scrutiny. In chilly Birmingham at the fag end of yet another wretched tour of the British Isles in 2014, Dhoni found himself at the business end of a T20I game - like he usually does in limited-overs contests. The task at hand was to score 17 off the final over bowled by Chris Woakes. Dhoni clubbed the ball over mid-wicket for six, hared away for a non-existent double to reduce the equation to 9 off 4.

Then he miscued one and denied Ambati Rayudu a single, hit a four off the next ball before rebuffing non-striker Rayudu's energetic plea to cross over yet again. Dhoni had taken it upon himself to score the five needed off the final ball. As luck would have it, another miscue meant only a single was possible and India ended the tour with another defeat.

It was a difficult task and one of those days when it didn't go our way. I thought I'm middling it, I have a good chance but it didn't pay off. I shoulder the responsibility for the defeat.

That was Leadership 101. It's easier to self-congratulate in success and pass the buck in adversity. Not all calls will go your way, but you still have to have the stomach to make the hard ones. Dhoni took the call, it backfired and he took responsibility. Classic.

Narbavie Rajendran - Selfless and out-of-the-blue, MSD's Test exit

Dhoni's selflessness was once again clearly evident on the day he announced his Test retirement after the drawn game against Australia in Melbourne. No emotions, no farewells, not even a hint in the post-match press conference. He kept it all to himself before letting the BCCI secretary and his teammates know about his decision privately.

He saw no point in continuing after India had lost another series overseas. He had already lost 3-1 in England prior to this. And with the team scheduled to play predominantly in the subcontinent in the near future, Dhoni decided to hang up his boots with immediate effect, despite being just 10 matches short of reaching a landmark of 100 Tests.

Dhoni's decision to not play a farewell Test also gave Wriddhiman Saha another opportunity to get a taste of Test cricket in Australian conditions. "Having seen that the series was already gone, maybe he felt that if he was going to go, then maybe this was the time to do it, and to give Virat Kohli a Test match in Australia to captain, Saha another opportunity in a Test match, and to start the process of taking India's Test team forward," Rahul Dravid had said on Dhoni's timing of the decision. That indeed highlighted the fact he belonged to a rare breed in a nation that has always been obsessed by numbers and farewells.

Bharath Ramaraj - MS Dhoni's gut feel

"Captaincy is 90% luck, only 10% skill - but don't try it without the 10%" - Richie Benaud, the former Australian captain, once said on leadership.

When MS Dhoni decided to step down from his role as the captain of India's limited-overs side, Richie Benaud's famous words rang a bell in my ears. The 35-year-old from Ranchi was known for his acute tactical nous and match awareness, especially in the abridged versions of the game.

In an era made up of coaching staff who spend a lot of time on drawing out pre-match plans, Dhoni took quite a few of his decisions on "gut feel". On numerous occasions, Dhoni had a premonition that led to India's revival and piloted the Asian country to snatch victory from jaws of defeat. One such match was the Champions Trophy final played between India and England at Edgbaston in 2013.

In a rain-truncated One-Day International that was reduced to 20 overs a side, England seemed to be in the ascendancy, with the home side requiring a further 19 runs off 15 balls to chase down 129. Eoin Morgan and Ravi Bopara had already strung together a 56-run stand for the fifth wicket and looked set to take England home. Dhoni, however, gave the ball to Ishant Sharma, who was struggling for form.

The move seemed to have backfired when Morgan pulled Ishant for a six in the 18th over. The tall seamer, though, kept India in the hunt with a slower one that tempted Morgan to flick it tamely to midwicket. It was followed by Bopara's dismissal, which was the turning point of the match.

The middle-order batsman pulled a short ball straight into the hands of Ravichandran Ashwin, stationed at square leg. Incidentally, Dhoni had just brought the square leg fielder inside the circle and that allowed Ishant to try the bouncer and was rewarded with the the prized scalp. Dhoni seemed to have thought of a plan to break the lock and Ishant duly unlocked it with the right key to taste success. The Indian captain then fell back on his tried and tested spin duo of Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja to propel the side to a momentous five-run triumph.

If we hit the rewind button and look back at the match, it was Dhoni's Midas touch that proved to be the telling difference between the two sides. Ishant's over encapsulates the point.