MS Dhoni asked me continue sledging Umar Akmal, reveals Suresh Raina

SportsCafe Desk

BySportsCafe Desk, SportsCafe Editor

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MS Dhoni has always been known to be a righteous and calm skipper, one who never resorted to unethical means to win games. However, Suresh Raina has revealed an incident when ‘Captain Cool’ had asked him to keep on sledging Pakistan’s Umar Akmal to create pressure on the opponent.

Suresh Raina and MS Dhoni are known to be the best of teammates for the past 12 years. Raina made his debut for the national team one year after Dhoni had made his debut in 2004 and they have won three major ICC events (2007 World T20, 2011 World Cup, and 2013 Champions Trophy)since then. Raina had also been an integral part of Chennai Super Kings, which Dhoni led for eight years winning the tournament twice. Raina continues to lead the list of most runs scored for the franchise with 4077 runs in 128 matches.

Hence, when the southpaw decided to have a chat on ‘Breakfast with Champions’, secrets were bound to spill. Among the many revelations that he made, which were contrary to popular belief, Raina narrated an incident when MS Dhoni had asked him to continue sledging Pakistan’s Umar Akmal to keep the pressure on the opponent.

Recalling a match between India and Pakistan, although not specifying which one, Raina narrated the situation when Pakistan were chasing a big target with India on the front foot.

"Once we were playing Pakistan and Umar Akmal was batting. He complained to Dhoni that I was abusing him. I just said that I did not abuse him. He (Dhoni) asked me what happened? I told him that I was trying to throw at Umar and asked him to score some runs to try and chase down the target," said a smiling Raina.

However, instead of calming his players, the skipper him to be more aggressive. ‘Phod daal usko...’, was Dhoni’s exact words as Raina recalled. Raina went on to explain that it meant that Dhoni wanted him to continue building pressure on the Pakistan batsman.

The middle-order batsman from Uttar Pradesh has struggled to find a place in the national team of late along with teammate Yuvraj Singh with reports claiming that the duo failed to pass the Yo-Yo test. However, Raina sounded positive about his comeback and stated that his hard work will pay off sooner or later.

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