Indian cricket's latest pin-up boy Mahendra Singh Dhoni might have become a top-grade soccer goalkeeper had he not strayed into the willow-cherry game.Starting his sports career as a goalkeeper in school, the Ranchi lad's keeping skills between the posts had prompted the coach to ask him to don the keeping gloves of cricket and the rest is history. What was soccer's loss turned out to be cricket's gain?
Agreeing with Bhattacharya, Dhoni's father Pan Singh said: ``my son used to play as a goalkeeper in colony football matches. He switched over to cricket after he was asked by the coach''.So, Dhoni is owe to his coach Chanchal Bhattacharya for today’s position. If the coach didn’t involve him with cricket then he should be a goalkeeper or nothing except an employee.
The month was June and I was happily waiting for the school to re-open. I was hoping to catch up with my friends and was told at the end of last year that we would be moving to new buildings for Grade Two classes. So I had lot things to look forward to and that was when I got the shock of my life. My parents told me that I was going to be put up in the hostel. I did not know what to do and I started crying. I had never been away from my parents. In spite of all my protests, I was admitted in the hostel. I still remember that day, I was crying non-stop and one of my uncles was in the last year of his schooling. He would come and console me saying that I can go home in a couple of weeks. The next day was when the school re-opened. I had a tinge of disappointment on my face but on seeing my friends again, it disappeared. As we were told, we moved into one of the new buildings. There were a couple of new joiners and we were ready to start Grade Two.