Dhoni's absence leaves dangerous vacuum in Indian team

Virat Kohli’s 102 led India to a much-needed win in their third ODI during the tri-series in West Indies. But the win was not without incident – and things took an ugly turn during a heated on-field exchange between Suresh Raina and Ravindra Jadeja.

The argument began just after the fall of the ninth West Indies wicket to Jadeja’s bowling. Sunil Narine and Kemar Roach had put on a frustrating 58 runs. That was all the invitation Jadeja needed to climb into Raina who had dropped both batsmen earlier, off Jadeja’s bowling.

According to The Sunday Express, Jadeja told Raina: “Because you’ve lost the captaincy, you’ve also lost interest in fielding?”

Veteran cricket writer Ayaz Memon though feels that in the absence of Mahendra Singh Dhoni there is a danger of these things spiraling out of control.

“These guys need to careful about only one thing is that there is Dhoni and then there is a vacuum before the younger lot fills in. Earlier, there were players like Virender Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh or Gautam Gambhir to challenge him for captaincy. But now there is a whole bunch of youngsters who all might fancy themselves as being number two,” said Ayaz.

“We all know that Kohli has the responsibility at the moment, but he is not the designated vice-captain. Sometimes, these things can spiral out of control. We saw that with the Australia cricket team when Shane Watson lost his vice-captaincy. So there is always a danger of things spiralling out of control, they are young, have big ego’s and things can happen. But hopefully this was just a blip and Dhoni is still there so he would have resolved matters.”

So how much of a difference does not having Dhoni on the field make to the Indian team?

“Dhoni is now in a very dominant position. If he had been on the field, I don’t think this kind of altercation would have happened – certainly the words spoken would not have been the same. So his presence is very, very vital. At 31, he is at least three years older than the rest of the bunch. And so much so that he now needs to have more than just a captain’s role… rather he needs to have a statesman’s role when it comes to Indian cricket.”

Watch the entire video discussion between Ashish Magotra and Ayaz Memon in the video above. They also discuss Sourav Ganguly saying Dhoni would skipper his all-time India ODI XI and the upcoming Milkha Singh biopic – Bhaag Milkha Bhaag