Former Indian skipper MS Dhoni on Saturday became just the fifth batsman to score 10,000 runs in One Day Internationals (ODI) for India. The wicketkeeper-batsman achieved this historic feat during the first ODI between Australia and India in Sydney.
He follows the footsteps of Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid and Virat Kohli to reach the 10k mark in ODIs for India.
Coming into this fixture, Dhoni had 10,173 runs in ODI format, but for the national team, he had scored 9,999 runs, with the other 174 runs coming when he featured for Asia XI in 2007. He reached the landmark in his 330th ODI for the national team.
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At the time when he achieved the feat, his mind was occupied with a different target in front of him. He was batting at 1, and India were 14 for 3 after six overs in their chase of 289.
In the first of the three-ODI series, Australia won the toss and chose to bat first. Despite the early dismissal of skipper Aaron Finch, which was soon followed by the dismissal of Alex Carey, the hosts kept moving forward at a brisk pace.
Usman Khawaja and Shaun Marsh steadied the innings with a slow but steady partnership as they weathered the early storm. The duo put up 92 for the third wicket, and it seemed the Aussies are in for a score of over 300.
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But Indian bowlers fought back in the middle overs, and despite some good partnerships between Marsh-Peter Handscomb, Handscomb-Marcus Stoinis, Stoinis-Glenn Maxwell, restricted the hosts to 288.
Chasing 289 on a pitch which averages a score of 320, India made the worst possible start as Shikhar Dhawan was dismissed for a duck in the very first over. The situation turned from bad to worse for the visitors, as in the space of three balls in the third over, they lost skipper Virat Kohli and Ambati Rayudu.