Back in 2007, when the inaugural T20 World Cup took place, India was not even close to being favorites to win the title. Firstly, the team was still reviving after their group stage elimination at the 50 overs World Cup and secondly, they had a new captain and the senior players had decided not to play the tournament. And lastly, the team had played only one T20I before that.
However, India shocked everyone by clinching the coveted trophy. It was a fairytale story for an Indian fan. Under the captaincy of MS Dhoni, India defeated Pakistan in the World T20 final by just five runs. It was S Sreesanth who took the catch of Misbah Ul Haq and helped India to win the tournament and register their names in the history books forever. His teammate from the World Cup-winning side,Robin Uthappa opened up recently about the catch.
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Talking about the last stages of the famous match during BBC’s Doosra Podcast, Uthappa said, “At the beginning of the over, I was at long-on. I remember Jogi bowling a wide on the first ball and I was like ‘man!’ I was praying. He bowled a wide first ball, and I was like ‘okay, let it not go for a six now’. Then he got hit for a six. And I was like, ‘come on, we can still do this’. Even in that situation, Pakistan had all the momentum going their way, I was backing our team.”
Recalling the famous catch by Sreesanth, Robin said that the fast-bowler was known to drop some catches during the training sessions. He explained that he has seen the pacer drop some absolute sitters.
Uthappa recalled, “Misbah hit a scoop shot, and I saw it going pretty high. I noticed that it wasn’t going really far. Then I saw who the fielder at short fine-leg was, and I saw it was Sreesanth. By that point, within the team, he was known for dropping catches, especially the easiest ones. I have seen him drop absolute sitters.”
The batsman, who plays for Kerala now, also said that Sreesanth just somehow managed to hold on to the ball. He pointed out that the pacer was still looking up when he caught the ball. In the end, he also revealed that it was destiny that won them the trophy.
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Robin explained, “As soon as I saw Sreesanth, I started running towards the wickets, and I started praying ‘please god, let him hold on to this one’. If you look at him taking that catch, you can see that when the ball actually entered his hands, he is looking up there (laughs). So, I still truly believe it was nothing but destiny that won us that World Cup.”
