Controversy: For Ravi Shastri, Sourav Ganguly was never a “Great” captain

According to Shastri, with so many wins under his leadership, no one can even come close to Dhoni.

By: News Desk |
January 10, 2017 12:48 pm

Former Indian cricketer Ravi Shastri sparked row after he didn’t include former skipper Sourav Ganguly in his list of best ever Indian skipper. However, he termed MS Dhoni as the “Dada Captain” who tops the list.

Shastri said,”By far, Dhoni is the best captain I have ever seen. My salaam to a dada captain. With so many wins under his leadership, no one can even come close to Dhoni. Simply, he is India’s most successful captain, by a distance. He is someone who never chased the chair. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have retired after 94 Tests in Australia,”

Shastri is quite happy with MSD’s decision. Being the former team manager of Team India, he spoke about how the selectors would see on the matter of team’s captaincy with the perspective of World Cup 2019.

In the context of captaincy owned by Virat Kohli, Shastri said,” With this decision, Virat will get enough time to prepare for the Champions Trophy. MS has won everything there was to win, he has nothing left with to prove,” adding to it that Kohli has a long way to go.

Following MS Dhoni, Kapil Dev is at the second spot in Shastri’s list. He has also entitled Ajit Wadekar (for the successive Test series victory in West Indies and England in 1971), Tiger Pataudi and Sunil Gavaskar for leading the side in the 1984 World Series win.

“The names included after MS Dhoni are at a fair distance from him. They are Kapil Dev, who led Indian to World Cup victory in 1983, Ajit Wadekar for leading the team in such a way that it won consecutive test series in West Indies and England and that in an era when One Day culture had emerged. And of course, Tiger (Pataudi) for his flamboyance. Baaki koi nahi (there is no one else),” he added.