In Captain's Defense: MS Dhoni

If one decides to seek depression these days, the simplest and surest way is to read current Indian media's outburst over Mahendra Singh Dhoni and his team's early departure from Twenty20 International. It's thoughtless, abrasive and if simply put very pedestrian. And with all it's glorious mediocrity, it has managed to demand Dhoni's captaincy out of vengeance. The reaction is quick, rushed and more often than not, with no due diligence and lacks analytical perspective. Allegations are thrown at his competency with unsubstantiated emotions and flashy news items are nothing more than another way to sensationalize the readily marketable commodity, cricket, in a cheapest possible way. So much so that former players have also unleashed, speaking in a manner as though they never played cricket or any other game in their lives. Ever. Most amusing has been from Mohammad Azharuddin, here. Has he forgotten his own dismal performances and many controversies that he was mired in? Get out, toil and till in the sun and develop (or at least try) all the tricks, tactics, stamina and game skills before having a strong opinion. It's different to spit opinions sitting in a nice air-conditioned room and give thousand advices on how things should have been done in that game and those conditions. The silliest (albeit dublew tee efff) comparison I have stumbled across is "Dhoni and co - please take some lessons from Anand on performing on the "big stage" under pressure." quoted verbatim. I almost rested my case here. Almost. This reminds me of an apt reply by Rachel Green of Friends when a doctor calls her Braxton Hicks contractions as mild discomfort. She quips, "no uterus, no opinion."

Update: Found an article by Kunal Pradhan that echoes my sentiments, here. A passage from it, below:

Next was the fairly regular, but usually standalone, players-have-become-too-fat-because-they-make-too-much-money angle. I’ve always loved this one, especially because it comes from pot-bellied former cricketers who haven’t gotten over the fact that they missed the party by a couple of decades but are trying to make it up by random TV appearances which they want to regularise.