Corner seat is reserved for Dhoni, we miss him: Chahal

Mahendra Singh Dhoni was dropped from the BCCI's list of centrally contracted players, raising fresh doubts on the future but Indian leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal said that the entire team misses the former skipper.

Chahal revealed that the team leaves a corner seat exclusively reserved for Dhoni. This information was was disclosed on Chahal TV during the team's bus ride to Hamilton for the third T20I against New Zealand in the five-game series.  

The video shows Chahal sitting beside the empty corner seat at the back of the bus, and saying, "Yeh woh seat hai jaha ek legend baitthe the. Mahi bhai (MS Dhoni). Abhi bhi yaha koi nahi baittha. Hum unhe bohot miss karte hai (A legend used to sit here. MS Dhoni. No one sits here now. We miss him a lot)."

The leg-spinner declared that Dhoni wanted to feature in the Chahal TV couple of times and even requested the spinner about the same.

"There is this one player who has never been on Chahal TV. He wanted to come a couple of times, and had even requested me a few times. But I said, 'not now'," started of Chahal before he pointed towards the seat where Dhoni usually sits in the team bus - the last row, corner seat. "No one sits here. We miss him a lot."

While Dhoni has not revealed anything about his future, he is expected to captain Chennai Super Kings in the 2020 IPL. Since the World Cup, he has missed the tour of the West Indies and the home series against South Africa, Bangladesh, the West Indies and the one against Australia.

Meanwhile, India took a 2-0 lead in the five-match series after registering their second successive win over New Zealand in Auckland.