Harbhajan Terms Greg Chappell's Coaching Stint As 'Worst Days Of Indian Cricket'

Harbhajan tweeted: "He asked Dhoni to play along the ground coz coach was hitting everyone out the park.. He was playing different games." He followed his tweet with a hashtag #worstdaysofindiancricketundergreg.

New Delhi: Veteran off-spinner Harbhajan Singh launched a sharp attack on former Indian coach Greg Chappell, terming his stint with the national team as the worst days in Indian cricket.

Harbhajan blasted Chappell's style of functioning during his coaching stint while responding to an article on India's highly succesfull skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni where the Australian is quoted as saying that he used to advice the Ranchi wicket-keeper  batsman to play along the ground more instead of trying to hit every ball across the fence. Harbhajan tweeted: "He asked Dhoni to play along the ground coz coach was hitting everyone out the park.. He was playing different games." He followed his tweet with a hashtag #worstdaysofindiancricketundergreg. Chappell was the head coach of the Indian team for two controversy-riddled years between 2005 and 2007 during which he locked horns with several senior members of the team, including having his set of differences with then Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly. His time with the Indian set-up, however, coincided with the rise of several younger players in the squad including Dhoni and Suresh Raina. "I vividly remember that I was left awestruck when I saw him batting for the first time. He was definitely the most exciting cricketer in India at that time. He used to hit the ball from the most unusual positions. He is the most powerful batsman I have ever seen," said Chappell during a chat session on the Facebook handle of the Playwrite Foundation. "I remember his knock of 183 against Sri Lanka and how he tore them apart. It was power hitting at its very best. The next match was in Pune. I asked MS, 'why don't you play along the ground more instead of trying to hit every ball to the boundary'. We were chasing 260-odd and were in a good position and Dhoni was playing a contrasting innings to the one he had played just a couple of days before. "We still needed 20 runs to win and Dhoni asked me, through 12th man R.P. Singh if he could hit sixes. I told him not until the target was in single digit. When we needed six runs to win, he finished the game with a six," he said.