Dhoni to captain Twenty-20 WC

Mahendra Singh Dhoni has become the first small-town cricketer to be named as the skipper of the Indian team when he was given the responsibility to lead the team in the inaugural Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa by the selectors on Tuesday in Mumbai. Yuvraj Singh has been named as the vice-captain of the team for the World Cup.

Test and ODI team discards Virender Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh and Irfan Pathan were also named in the 15-member team for the Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa.

There is more good news for the Pathan household as Irfan’d elder brother Yusuf Pathan, who is a handy lower order batsman and an off-break bowler, has also made it to the Twenty20 World Cup squad.

The squad for both the Twenty20 World Cup, which will be held from September 11-28, and the seven-match One Day series against England was announced by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) Secretary Niranjan Shah.

Dhoni is already the vice-captain of the One-Day team and his elevation as the skipper of the Twenty20 team was very much on the cards after senior players like Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid, who is also the skipper of the Test and One-Day team, informed the selectors that they did not want to be a part of the team for the Twenty20 World Cup.

Pacer Zaheer Khan has also been rested while S Sreesanth has been dropped from the Indian ODI team for the series against England.

However, there was good news for Munaf Patel, who has been recalled to replace Sreesanth after being ignored for Test series and the preceding ODI against Ireland and South Africa.

Indian squad for Twenty20 World Cup: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (C), Yuvraj Singh (Vice-captain), Virender Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh, Ajit Agarkar, Dinesh Karthik, Gautam Gambhir, Robin Uthappa, Joginder Sharma, Yusuf Pathan, Piyush Chawla, S Sreesanth, Irfan Pathan, Rudra Pratap Singh and Rohit Sharma.

His sister, Jayati says that, “Marriage proposals are raining on us,”. But the Dhoni family does not have any plans to marry him off right now. Even the 24-year-old himself is not ready to settle down yet. “We will think about marriage after three years,” Jayati said. And what kind of girl do they have in mind for Dhoni? “We will prefer a good-natured girl who can adjust in our family,” she said.

The Dhoni family is also receiving scores of letters and greeting cards from fans. Many letters reach the Dhonis even without the complete address. A simple “MS Dhoni, Ranchi” seems enough.