Dhoni takes external pressure out of the equation: Pretorius

MUMBAI: Dwaine Pretorius, a South African all-rounder for the Chennai Super Kings, has revealed that skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s calm demeanour on and off the field is due to the fact that he removes pressure from the equation.

CSK may have slipped in the current edition of the tournament, but the 33-year-old bowling all-rounder has said that ‘Captain Cool’ doesn’t mind losing and keeps focusing “on the process,” making him one of the best in the business even at the age of 40.

“One of the biggest reasons he (Dhoni) says he doesn’t mind losing is he doesn’t feel like it’s necessary to put any other external pressures on himself. So he takes away the pressure of winning or losing the match and he focuses on the process. The process is something that is super important and allows MS to deal with pressure,” wrote Pretorius on his website Talent-Mastered.com.

“He controls his breathing, and he takes away the external pressure of having to win every match or having to win every moment that he’s involved in. Then he knows where his strengths are, and knows which balls he can smoke for a six or which balls he can’t.”

Pretorius stated that he learned about a bowler’s mindset while bowling in the death overs from Dhoni.

“Another big lesson I took from MS in terms of dealing with pressure at the back end when it comes to death batting is the fact that the bowler only needs to miss once and the pressure is all on him. The bowler’s mindset is — I can’t afford to lose this game. So just this shift in mindset has really made MS one of the best finishers of all time, and I believe that is what makes him successful,” added Pretorius.