Dhoni lauds Tendulkar for his amazing batting display

Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni praised Sachin Tendulkar for his "amazing" display of shots but lamented that his team could not shave off the New Zealand tail, which wagged in the third one-dayer here on Sunday.

"He (Tendulkar) is an amazing batsman. The kind of shots he plays is amazing," Dhoni said about Tendulkar, who retired hurt at the score of 163 in India's 58-run win.

"Even Yuvraj (Singh) is a difficult batsman when he is in form. The way they both were playing we could easily predict that our total would be past 390," he said after the match.

Dhoni said he had great faith in his batsmen which encourages him to play with a bowler less sometimes.

"That's our strength. We rely on our batting. If we have a bowler less than we have a good total on the board and put the opposition under pressure.

"We play with four bowlers and a few part-timers but then also we can put the opposition under pressure," he said.

Dhoni said he and his team had few things to learn from today's match and pointed out that they should have polished off the Kiwi tail sooner than later.

"They had a big second-last wicket partnership. We were not up-to-the-mark in shaving off the last few batsmen. But we are learning from each and every mistake which we commit."

Tim Southee and Kyle Mills shared an 83-run ninth wicket partnership for New Zealand to delay the inevitable.

Tendulkar, who played a brilliant 163-run knock today, said the ground was a bit unique and the batsmen required to judge it before playing shots.

"The ground is a bit unique and we had to figure out the dimensions of the ground and play accordingly," said the batting maestro, who was adjudged man-of-the-match.

The 35-year-old right-handed batsman, who is playing international cricket for last 19 years, said although he had not played many ODIs in New Zealand, he was waiting for long for a century to his credit here.

"I had always been wanting to get a 100 here. In 1994 when I started opening for India I scored 84 in my first match and that was closest probably that I came near getting a 100 here.

"Last time around I twisted my ankle so basically I had not played many ODIs here," he added.

"I felt pretty good in Wellington but I lost momentum there due to rains. Here it was no such thing fortunately, so I played some good shots," he said.