Dhoni more influential than Obama: Time

Indian cricket captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni has been ranked above football icon Lionel Messi and US President Barack Obama in Time magazine’s 2011 list of 100 most influential people.

The cricket world cup title win after 28 years helped Dhoni secure the 52nd rank. He was the only Indian sportsperson to make the list this year. Dhoni is the second Indian sportsman after Sachin Tendulkar to make the prestigious list.
Other Indians on the list were billionaire Mukesh Ambani (61), neuroscientist V S Ramachandran (79), Wipro chairman and philanthropist Azim Premji (88) and social activist Aruna Roy (89).

The magazine described the 29-year-old as “Captain Fantastic”. Dhoni, has 2,925 runs in 54 Tests and 6,049 runs in 186 one-day internationals. The team had won the inaugural Twenty20 World Championship in 2007 under his leadership. Author Chetan Bhagat described the ace captain in the magazine as India’s best captain ever, exuding both cool confidence and down-to-earth humility. “As astonishing as Dhoni’s talent is his background. Indian success stories are usually associated with pedigree, connections and power. Dhoni, from a small-town family of modest means, had none of these, but he’s shown India that you can make it with only one thing: Excellence. Dhoni doesn’t just lead a cricket team; he’s also India’s captain of hope. And he didn’t just win India the World Cup; he also taught India how to win,” read the accompanying profile written by Bhagat.This year the list was topped by Wael Ghonim, the Google executive who became the “Spokesman for a Revolution” in Egypt as decribed by the magazine. Others in the list include Obama (86), US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton (43), Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg (6), WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange (9) and Pakistani spy chief Ahmed Shuja Pasha (17).