Playing with MS Dhoni has been an honour: KL Rahul

Indian Cricketer Lokesh Rahul credited recently retired Indian Cricketer MS Dhoni for being an inspiration to him with his calm demeanour and bringing the best out of every player.

In a video released by the official Twitter handle of the Indian Premier League (IPL), Rahul said, “Playing with MS Dhoni is such an honour and every day has been a huge learning. And that’s something I will treasure for the rest of my life and career. There have been times when we had a good quite partnership in the middle. The calmness he (Dhoni) has and the way he has got the best out of each player, everybody would try to learn from him.”

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Rahul added, “It (Dhoni’s retirement) was quite an emotional moment for the whole country and for world cricket. We have all grown up wanting to be MS Dhoni. Especially for someone like me who comes from a small town, he was our hero. We always told our families, look it doesn’t matter where you come from, you can always go and try and achieve your dreams.

“I am quite sure I won’t have enough words to tell him. I will just give him a long hug and say thank you and probably ask him to go easy on Kings XI this time.”

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Rahul, who is set to lead the Kings XI in the IPL starting in a couple of months, also said that the current coach of the franchise, Anil Kumble has made his life “very easy” as a captain. “Somebody like Anil bhai helps me immensely because I share a very good relationship off the field as we are from the same state and (he) has made (my) life as captain very easy,” said Rahul. “I know he (Anil Kumble) will do most of the planning and I just have to go out in the middle and carry it out.”