Mahi bhai is not my friend, he is my guru: Khaleel Ahmed

Khaleel Ahmed impressed everyone with his bowling for the Delhi Capitals in the Indian Premier League 2024. He was subsequently drafted into the reserved players list for the T20 World Cup 2024. Though the pacer could not sneak into the squad, he travelled to Zimbabwe for the T20I series. After the white ball series against Sri Lanka, Khaleel revealed that he considers MS Dhoni as his teacher.

Khaleel was one of those youngsters who debuted when the legendary Dhoni was around. He played his first game for India in an Asia Cup 2021 ODI against Hong Kong. He travelled to different continents with the team and in New Zealand, a picture of Dhoni giving flowers to the pacer went viral. Shedding light on the same, Khaleel described the former India captain’s gesture and also added that Dhoni made his dream, of bowling first over, come true.

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"We were in New Zealand, Mahi bhai's fans had given him flowers, he passed it onto me and some fans took a photo, it was quite memorable for me. Mahi bhai is not my friend, not my elder brother, he is my guru,” said Khaleel on Aakash Chopra’s YouTube channel.

“Since my childhood I wanted to become the bowler who took the first over from India since I had watched Zaheer Khan growing up. In the Asia Cup, Mahi bhai, asked me to bowl the first over. I ran so hard, away from the huddle thinking that if I give it time he might change his mind,” he added.

The 26-year-old could not fetch any wicket in the ODI series against Sri Lanka as the visitors were whitewashed by 3-0. However, he managed to pick three wickets in as many T20Is in the Zimbabwe tour. Speaking of his IPL 2024 performance, he featured in 14 games and managed to pluck 17 wickets at an average of 17.64 and a hefty economy rate of 9.58.