Book Review: MS Dhoni- The Man, The Leader

Book: MSD- The Man, The Leader

Author: Biswadeep Ghosh

Publisher: Rupa Publications

Pages: 240

Price: Rs 137

Ever since he made his international debut in 2004 and went on to become a hugely popular cricketer — even surpassing the likes of Sachin Tendulkar in popularity charts — the story of Mahendra Singh Dhoni has been known to all those who follow the sport.

He's the man who has made Ranchi a world-famous name through his exploits on the field, the man who is the only captain to lift all the three world titles — the 50-over World Cup, the World T20 and Champions Trophy — the man who has made some unthinkable decisions on the field, some of which have succeeded while some others have not… there is nothing that is unknown about Dhoni's public life.

The 240-page MSD: The Man, The Leader is Pune-based freelance writer and columnist Biswadeep Ghosh's first attempt at a sports book – he has previously written biographies of actors and two books of fiction for young adults. It is a well-tried effort to chronicle the life story of Ranchi's most famous son from his school days through to his days in Kharagpur, where he was recruited by South Eastern Railway on sports quota, and to his retirement from Tests in 2014 end.

But the book leaves a lot to be desired. Ghosh has interviewed those who have known Dhoni from his childhood days, including his coaches and teammates. He also writes that almost everyone in Ranchi seems to know a lot about Dhoni. "If one were to trust self-indulgent myth-weavers in Ranchi, the cricketer owns anything between five hundred and one thousand bikes, the number depending on how big a liar one is talking to," Ghosh writes.

A majority of the book has extracts from various publications and match-reports that gives one a feeling that this book is nothing but a compilation of newspaper clippings in a small, bound form that you could carry in your pocket.

The book has covered almost all the international series that Dhoni has played in, summarising his performances and supporting them by the captain's post-match quotes, something that is routine for journalists filing copies at the end of each day's play. This being a biography, one would have wished to read beyond mundane match reports that are available on the internet.

What is unknown about Dhoni continues to remain unknown. While reams and reams have been written about Dhoni, the captain cool, the book does not say how he has managed to stay calm in tense situations; especially as Dhoni rarely gives media interviews and one can generally hear him only during the mandatory captain's press conferences before and after matches. What we all want to know is how the mind of MSD works, what goes into the thought processes that make him take some unimaginable decisions, catching everyone off guard. These are missing from the book.

While Dhoni has stayed controversy-free throughout his career, Ghosh has played it safe by not going deep into the IPL spot-fixing case that dragged the cricketer's name as captain of Chennai Super Kings.

The book ends up as one more on Dhoni, who has had humble beginnings ("The room that was given to him did not have any attached toilet. Hence Dhoni had to use a common one. He bathed in the open by standing next to a wall") and went on to become one of the richest sportspersons in the world.

You won't miss much if you don't possess the book. What the whole world will wait anxiously for is Dhoni's story in his own words – a la Sachin Tendulkar a year after the maestro retired from all forms of cricket.