Dhoni and Ranchi, Ranchi and Dhoni – an affair to celebrate
Don Bradman. Virender Sehwag. Mahendra Singh Dhoni. Common thread? Bruising batsmanship, of course. The innate gift of entertaining with a cricket bat in hand, the first one with relentless obsession, we are told, the other two with a more carefree but no less well-thought-out approach in the modern era of heavy willows and innovative craftsmanship.
These are also men who have put their town/locality/city on the cricketing landscape. Often, a person’s identity is embellished by where he comes from. With these three gentlemen, it’s the other way round.
Would the cricketing world have celebrated Bowral, for instance, had the Don not hailed from there? Would anyone beyond the immediate vicinity of Najafgarh have even heard of that little pocket in India’s national capital had the Nawab of Najafgarh not unleashed his mayhem on unsuspecting bowlers from all parts of the cricketing stratosphere?
And, what would Ranchi’s standing have been as a cricketing entity had the man with the once flowing locks, the twirling blade and the still intact nerves of steel not burst through with an impact as telling as it was exhilarating?
The Dhoni effect in this gradually developing second-tier cricketing city isn’t ubiquitously obvious. It is not as if wherever you turn, there is the former India captain, smiling down benevolently from billboards and cut-outs. In fact, there are almost as many images of Virat Kohli, of course, but also of Saurabh Tiwary and the unlikely figure of Muttiah Muralitharan that dot the roads as there are of Dhoni bhaiyya. While seeing is oftentimes believing, the Dhoni impact here is more to be experienced than seen.
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