Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the buccaneering wicketkeeper-batsman, is on the cusp of another record. Dhoni needs just 33 runs to reach the 10,000-run mark in One Day Internationals (ODIs) and can become the fourth Indian batsman after Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Saurav Ganguly to achieve the landmark.
The Jharkhand player has scored 9,967 runs in 318 ODIs and has 11 players ahead of him in the list of leading ODIs scorers. He has 9,793 runs when batting for India and 174 for Asia XI. He will emulate Sri Lankan Kumar Sangakkara who is the only wicketkeeper-batsman in the list of top 10 ODI run scorers with 14,234 runs in 404 matches.
Apart from Dhoni, Indian captain Virat Kohli too is nearing 10,000 runs in ODIs. Kohli has 9,588 from 208 ODIs before the first match against England on Thursday (July 12, 2018).
Top 20 scorers in ODIs (till July 12, 2018) | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Player/Country | Matches | Innings | Not Out | Runs | HS |
SachinTendulkar/India | 463 | 452 | 41 | 18426 | 200* |
Kumar Sangakkara/Sri Lanka | 404 | 380 | 41 | 14234 | 169 |
Ricky Ponting/Australia | 375 | 365 | 39 | 13704 | 164 |
Sanath Jayasuriya/Sri Lanka | 445 | 433 | 18 | 13430 | 189 |
Mahela Jayawardene/Sri Lanka | 448 | 418 | 39 | 12650 | 144 |
Inzamam-ul-Haq/Pakistan | 378 | 350 | 53 | 11739 | 137* |
Jacques Kalllis/South Africa | 328 | 314 | 53 | 11579 | 139 |
Saurav Ganguly/India | 311 | 300 | 23 | 11363 | 183 |
Rahul Dravid/ India | 344 | 318 | 40 | 10889 | 153 |
Brian Lara/West Indies | 299 | 289 | 32 | 10405 | 169 |
Tillakaratne Dilshan/ Sri Lanka | 330 | 303 | 41 | 10290 | 161* |
Mahendra Singh Dhoni/ India | 318 | 272 | 78 | 9967 | 183* |
Mohammad Yousuf/Pakistan | 288 | 273 | 40 | 9720 | 141* |
Adam Gilchrist/Australia | 287 | 279 | 11 | 9619 | 172 |
Virat Kohli/India | 208 | 200 | 35 | 9588 | 183 |
Chris Gayle/West Indies | 281 | 276 | 17 | 9585 | 215 |
AB de Villiers/South Africa | 228 | 218 | 39 | 9577 | 176 |
Mohammad Azharuddin/India | 334 | 308 | 54 | 9378 | 153* |
Aravinda de Silva/Sri Lanka | 308 | 296 | 30 | 9284 | 145 |
Saeed Anwar/Pakistan | 247 | 244 | 19 | 8824 | 194 |
Dhoni is also in the race to score more runs than any Indian batsman in ODIs against England. While Yuvraj Singh has 1,523 runs in ODIs against England, Tendulkar is second with 1,455 and Dhoni is on the third spot with 1,425.
He is also three short of taking 300 catches in ODIs. The wicketkeepers ahead of Dhoni in terms of catches in ODIs are former Australian player Adam Gilchrist (417), South Africa's March Boucher (402) and Sangakkara (383).
The first ODI between India and England will be played on July 12 (Thursday) at Trent Bridge, Nottingham while the second match is on July 14 at Lord's, London. The third ODI is on July 17 at Headingley, Leeds.