Another inconspicuous sign-off for Dhoni

MS Dhoni’s last act before the BCCI issued an advisory to inform that he had stepped down as India’s limited-overs captain was a 30-minute long meeting with his Jharkhand team-mates on their Ranji Trophy campaign.

He chatted with them about the highs and lows, on a campaign that, in many ways, was pathbreaking. This was Jharkhand’s first-ever semi-final since their entry in 2004. When the world received a typically short message that didn’t state why he had done so, Dhoni was fiddling away on his Playstation console, challenging his mates to a game of FIFA even as four security guards stood outside the room preventing the hotel staff and bell boys from seeking autographs or the in-demand selfie.

After everyone had dispersed though, he rallied his team together for a small dinner. He walked out relaxed, as if nothing in the world had changed for him even if everyone else, particularly in the cricket fraternity, had an evening of hard work ahead, as was the case when he dropped the bombshell of his Test retirement minutes after a post-match press conference in Melbourne where there was no inkling of what was to follow.

In Dhoni’s world though, the news of his retirement may have been just another little thing. Over the last four days in Nagpur, there was little to suggest his hunger had diminished, or his appetite for batting and those helicopter …

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