‘I wanted to go…’: MS Dhoni reveals reason behind promoting himself over Yuvraj Singh in 2011 World Cup final

Legendary India cricketer MS Dhoni who captained the side that went on to win the 2011 ODI World Cup, has revealed the reason why he promoted himself in the batting order over all-rounder Yuvraj Singh in the final against Sri Lanka.

Dhoni played a match-winning knock of 91 runs from just 79 deliveries to propel India to their first ODI World Cup title in 28 years. The India skipper formed fantastic partnerships of 109 and 54 with Gautam Gambhir and Yuvraj respectively to help India reach the target of 275 with 10 deliveries left to spare.

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Dhoni suddenly elevating himself up the order came as a surprise to many at that time and now the former India captain has himself explained why he took the unexpected decision.

In a video going viral on the internet from a recent event, Dhoni opened up about the decision to come ahead of Yuvraj in the final and said that he wanted to go because of the presence of three off-spinners in Sri Lanka’s playing XI, two of whom were his former teammates at Chennai Super Kings.

“Gautam (Gambhir) and Virat (Kohli) had a very good partnership, and Yuvraj was in form. Yuvi was having a very good World Cup. So, the tricky decision was whether Yuvi should go in or, you know, I wanted to… there was something in me; I wanted to go,” Dhoni said.

“The reason was simple; it was very experience-driven. If you look at the (Sri Lankan) bowling at that time, the bowlers who were going to bowl in the middle overs. Murli sir (Muralitharan) was there, Suraj Randiv was there, and (Tillakaratne) Dilshan was there in the part-timers, all three of them off-spinners. And two of the three off-spinners had played for CSK. So, Murli sir was with CSK, Suraj Randiv was with CSK, which meant that I had batted them a lot in nets. And it is said that it becomes a little easier to play off spinners for righties (right-handed batters),” Dhoni added.