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India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni believes the second edition of the IPL will be perfect practice for T20 World Cup.
Incidentally, the two Twenty20 Internationals against New Zealand here are India's last opportunity to play as a team before the World Cup but Dhoni believes IPL would be the right platform to prepare for the mega event.

"Every game is important. These are two Twenty20 international games. But I think it will be important to focus on the IPL more," said Dhoni, who led India to triumph in the 2007 Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa.

"It (IPL) would not help us only. It will help other players also who are part of IPL, which is a big tournament. Right now these two matches against New Zealand are too far away to contribute to the Twenty20 World Cup scenario," said Dhoni.
Wright visits Team India's nets

Dhoni also reckoned that inputs from former India coach John Wright, now a Kiwi selector, would help the hosts.

"Being an international cricketer and a coach, he will know the shortcomings. John will know the psychology of each and every Indian player. That psychological part of the input given by John will help them," Dhoni said.

Expectation would be high as Dhoni's men go into the series but the Indian skipper seemed unperturbed by that.

"What we have done in the last few months is that we have diverted our attention from the expectations to the process and what we want to achieve. Expectation is set by others and can be too high to achieve. As individuals you know your potential and you know what you can do and accordingly you can fix it. This is what I want to do in this series," he said.

Dhoni also spared a thought for the weather here and said, "The temperature has been up and down. The wind is pretty cold. A lot depends on the conditions tomorrow. If it is cloudy and there is a bit of rain, it will help the seamers. But if there is too much rain, the ball will become soggy and the batsmen will benefit. At the end of the day it will depend on how the weather pans out. But overall, it has been cold so far."