1. Dhoni was born on 7 July 1981 in Ranchi, Jharkhand after his family moved to the city from Uttarakhand.
2. Dhoni's paternal village Lvali is in the Lamgarha block of the Almora District of Uttarakhand.
3. Dhoni studied at the DAV Jawahar Vidya Mandir in Ranchi and was into sports from a very young age.
4. Before taking up cricket full-time, Dhoni excelled in football and badminton. He played at the district and club level in both football and badminton.
5. Dhoni was an excellent goalkeeper and his skills in football caught the attention of his childhood coach Keshav Bannerjee, who urged him to try his hand at cricket and wicketkeeping.
6. Dhoni was a Travelling Ticket Examiner (TTE) at Kharagpur railway station from 2001 to 2003, under South Eastern Railway in Midnapore.
7. The East zone team which won the Deodar Trophy in the year 2004, rejected Dhoni at first saying he had an unconventional playing style.
8. While playing for the Central Coal Fields Limited in the Sheesh Mahal tournament, Dhoni used to get Rs 50 from his coach Deval Sahay for each six that he hit in the matches.
9. Dhoni made his debut for Bihar in the Ranji Trophy against Assam in 1999-2000 season. He scored 68 not out in his maiden innings and finished the season with 283 runs in five matches.
10. Dhoni is known for his passion for motorcycles. His love for two-wheelers started from a very young age and he now has an enviable list of bikes ranging from the very old to the very exclusive.
MS Dhoni is known for his passion for motorcycles (MS Dhoni Instagram)
11. Dhoni owns bikes such as the Yamaha RD350, Harley Davidson Fatboy, Ducati 1098, Kawasaki Ninja H2 and the super exclusive Confederate Hellcat X132. The former India captain is the only one to own this rare bike in South East Asia.
12. The 'Helicopter Shot', which Dhoni is famous for, was taught to him during a tennis-ball tournament in Ranchi by his friend Santosh Lal.
13. Dhoni made his international debut in an ODI match against Bangladesh in Chittagong and got run out from the first ball he faced while batting at No. 7.
14. Dhoni has played 131 First-class matches and scored 7038 runs at 36.84 with nine hundreds and 47 half-centuries.
15. In 296 ODIs Dhoni has amassed 9496 runs at an average of 51.32 with 10 hundreds and 64 fifties. He is the second highest run-scorer as a wicketkeeper in one-day internationals.
16. Dhoni retired from Test cricket in December 2014 but not before he scoring 4876 in 90 matches at 38.09 with six hundreds and 33 fifties. Virat Kohli took over the captaincy after Dhoni's retirement.
17. Dhoni is the only captain in world cricket to win all three ICC trophies - 2007 World T20, 2011 World Cup and 2013 Champions Trophy.
Dhoni is the only captain in world cricket to win all three ICC trophies (AP Photo)
18. Dhoni is the most successful Indian Test captain with 27 Test wins, eclipsing Sourav Ganguly's record of 21. He is also the most successful ODI and T20I captain for India with 110 and 41 wins respectively.
19. Dhoni is the third captain in world cricket to win more than 100 ODI matches after Australia's Ricky Ponting and Allan Border.
20. In just his fifth ODI, Dhoni was promoted up the batting order at No. 3 and he repaid the team management's faith by smashing 148 off 123 balls against Pakistan in Vizag. It was his maiden hundred in international cricket and is the fastest ton by an Indian wicket-keeper in ODIs.
21. Dhoni married Sakshi Singh Rawat on 4 July, 2010. Sakshi hails from Dehradun, Uttarakhand. At the time of their marriage, she was studying Hotel Management and was working as a trainee at the Taj Bengal in Kolkata.
22. Dhoni made sure to keep his wedding away from the media glare and it was attended only by his close friends and family members. Actor John Abraham and Bipasha Basu were also a part of the celebrations.
You must be logged in to post a comment.