Did MS Dhoni want to go out on a high at the 2019 World Cup? 

Former Indian captain MS Dhoni’s surprise retirement from international cricket on Saturday evening has caught everyone on the wrong foot. A surprise that has followed constant speculation about his future in the last one year.

However, the question that needs to be asked at this hour is “was he planning to hang his boots at the 2019 World Cup in England, wherein he played his last ODI game itself?”

It seems obvious that MS Dhoni has had such plans as there is no better way for a champion cricketer to quit the game than when on a high – a World Cup win for India last year would have been the summit from where he could gracefully fade into the shadows.

A close friend of MS Dhoni confirmed to Sportskeeda that retiring from international cricket was at the back of the former India captain's mind days before the World Cup began.

That close aide also said that the champion captain had hinted at his retirement at a time when he was on a two-match sabbatical after the third ODI in Ranchi against Australia during the 2019 spring. This was something MS Dhoni is said to have spent a considerable amount of time thinking over.

Hence, it was felt that Dhoni's retirement announcement at the victory stage would be a fitting reply to a champion of his stature – someone who won all three ICC tournaments as the leader of the pack, right from the inaugural World T20 in South Africa, 2011 World Cup at home and 2013 Champions Trophy in England.

However, that direct hit from Martin Guptill after MS Dhoni scored 50 off 72 deliveries in the semifinal game against New Zealand ended India’s run at the 2019 World Cup. According to some of his close aides, that historic loss at the hands of New Zealand also pushed the grand retirement announcement plan on the back-burner.

MS Dhoni's legacy is one that will never die down

The punters did agree that he should gracefully orchestrate his exit while the going is good for him and say bye to the international arena on a good note. To his credit, MS Dhoni had given up Test leadership and also resigned from Test cricket at a time when he thought he had enough of the game. He had also handed the ODI captaincy to Virat Kohli in 2017 so that the latter could build the team from then on.

Therefore, the decision not to announce anything led to endless speculations. Fortunately, MS Dhoni was unperturbed, stayed his ground, pondered if there was any scope to continue just to ensure a perfect ending to his script. However, that opportunity didn’t come as Covid-19 put off the T20 World Cup in Australia this year.

In between, he carried on with the flow and kept away from social media, often giving an impression to his detractors of being an arrogant cricketer. The moment Sourav Ganguly - whom MS Dhoni doesn’t have a great liking for and the feeling is mutual for the way Dada was shown the door - took over as president of the BCCI, the Jharkhand cricketer was almost sure that his days at the highest level was almost over.

Now that it is indeed over, we can also say that in terms of achievement, MS Dhoni is clearly in the exalted league of Kapil Dev, who got us the first World Cup.

MS Dhoni got us two World Cups.

Therefore, it’s right to say that the dark horse has never got it wrong – be it on-field or off it. Saturday – August 15 – wasn’t any different when he decided to free himself on the 74th Independence Day of the country.