Mahendra Singh Dhoni is happy playing boring cricket while chasing low scores if it ensures a victory for India. Dhoni has played such scintillating knocks time and again but this one went done to the wire. Still it was his brutal hitting which took India over the finishing line. India managed to clinch this win with one wicket and two balls to spare.
Captain Cool was quoted by Indian Express saying, "At times in these low scoring matches, you need to play boring cricket. It doesn't matter whether you win in the 48th or 49th over.” Dhoni has the ability to pulling out things from near impossible situtaion and he did exactly that despite carrying the hamstring injury in this final.
He threw some more light on why he wanted to play the finals even when he wasn’t at the best of his fitness levels. "Sometimes you don't really wait to be 100 hundred percent fit. The problem with hammy (hamstring) injury is that there is a chance of re-occurence. Since it was the final and we have two months off after this, I thought about taking the risk. I just tried to avoid the pressure on my right hamstring and tried to deviate that pressure." He had accolades for young Virat Kohli, who brought Indian team to the finals of the tournament.
Dhoni was quoted by Deccan Chronicle was quoted saying, "Virat did a tremendous job with a young side. Now he will be leading the team to Zimbabwe where it will be a good exposure for the new set of bowlers who are not as experienced as the current crop. If they do well, our bench strength will only increase.”
In the penultimate over of the match, Ishant could have been run-out and for that Dhoni scolded him at that very moment but later he said, "The problem with tall fast bowlers is that there is a lot of distance between the brain and the receptors."
Captain Cool added, "I was avoiding singles in the 49th over because if I had to play the last couple of deliveries and I happened to miss it, it would have increased pressure on Ishant. He is not very good at rotating strike and also with him I could have at the best run a single."
Dhoni praised Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Rohit Sharma for their valuable contribution in this tight finished encounter. He was quoted by The Hindu saying, "Credit to Bhuvi as he played atleast 6-10 deliveries from Malinga which meant that the next two batsmen didn't have to face too many deliveries from Malinga. It was an interesting match where frankly speaking we were not in a good position. I wanted the tail-enders to stay as long as possible which would give a me a chance."
"Rohit has been brilliant and looked very confident from the start. It's always good to see him score runs. It helps the middle-order when he scores but some of the shot selections weren't great."
About Jadeja not getting to complete his quota of 10 overs, Dhoni explained, "Since two left-handers (Sangakkara and Thirimanne) were playing I thought that it is better to continue with two off-spinners Ashwin and Raina. Also I gave Virat a few overs since the ball was semi-new. For me it was fine to have done away with two overs of Jadeja," he concluded.