The 1st World T20 Final

“In the Air...Sreesanth… Takes It…India WINS” – boomed Ravi Shastri as Misbah-ul-Haq’s attempted scoop shot was caught much short of its intended destination. And with that final act, India became the inaugural World Twenty20 champions.

For the Indian fan, it was a perfect finale to a near-perfect event. A world tournament final victory, coming over your historical arch-rivals was just the balm needed to heal the wounds from the ODI World Cup earlier in the year.

The tournament had been a grand spectacle. Music, player introductions, bowl-outs, fireworks and dancing cheerleaders were some of the innovations which were well received by the audience. For the marketing men, the final was a dream match-up like the perfect icing on the cake. The finalists— India and Pakistan – historical arch-rivals, both seeking redemption for their respective horrendous show in the ODI World Cup. They had played a thrilling tie earlier in the tournament which India won 3-nil in a bowl-out.

India suffered a setback before the start with Virender Sehwag missing the final through injury. In came debutant Yusuf Pathan as his replacement. Dhoni won the toss and chose to bat first. Pathan began his international career in a spectacular fashion launching the very second ball he faced from Asif into the stands but he fell soon after. Gautam Gambhir played a steady hand while wickets fell regularly at the other end.  The most memorable moment of the innings arrived when Gambhir smashed a six straight into the scoreboard. “That’s one way to get the scoreboard moving” was the gem from the commentary box. India ended up with a seemingly below-par total of 157.

Pakistan should have chased this in a canter but the World Cup final has its own pressures. Tight bowling and fielding combined with some reckless shots had handed over the initiative to India. The Indian fans thought the match was in the bag but Misbah had other ideas. There was a flurry of big shots while wickets kept falling at the other end.

Pakistan needed 13 runs off the last over with Misbah on strike and only one wicket remaining. Here Dhoni made the crucial choice. He handed the ball to Joginder Sharma ahead of the much more experienced Harbhajan Singh. Dhoni’s sheer gut feeling seemed to be the only logical explanation for this choice as Joginder bowled a wide and then was hit for a straight six. Everyone’s nerves were all over the place and Misbah seemed to be the only calm one. And then the third ball of the over. Misbah tried the scoop shot, the ball seemed to have been hit perfectly rising in the air as we saw the crowds in the background. With bated breath, we saw the ball begin its descent. Was it going to cross the boundary or was it falling short? The ball came down and landed safely into the hands of the waiting short fine leg fielder. Misbah was down to his haunches and the Indian team was celebrating.

I was watching the game with some hundred others in my college common room, which had never been so crowded before. There had been a hushed silence with everyone doing their best not to jinx the Indian team by any sort of movement. Sressanth caught the ball and the whole room erupted. An instant party followed.

All thoughts of assignments and submissions for the next day had gone for a toss. They would wait. After all we were now the World Champions.

P.S. - This article was written as part of the ongoing #BeACricketWriter Contest being conducted by Harsha Bhogle

The IPL Experience

April 22, 2011: IPL Mumbai Indians vs Chennai Super Kings, Mumbai.

Almost one year (362 days to be precise) to the date, I went to a stadium to watch the match. And it was between the same two teams as last time. The location and result were diiferent though. An unplanned trip to Wankhede, (or rather planned very late in the day) certainly made it a "Good" Friday.

The Journey
There was a dash from my office in Navi Mumbai (yes, my office was open on the day when probably everyone else was on holiday). The dash felt like being part of "The Amazing Race". Auto ride, followed by a train ride, followed by a taxi and reached Wankhede, only to realize that had arrived at the wrong gate. Entry gate being at the opposite end of the stadium meant taking another train (might be sounding unbelievable but thats what it was), and then a little walk. Add the uncertainty of whether tickets had been arranged or not, and it made for a pretty mad cross-city dash. During the second train ride heard the famous IPL bugle and the roar of the crowd to signify that the game had started.
Despite all this managed to be inside the stadium, having missed only the first over, though Sathish was out by that time. By the time settled down into the seat, Sachin was also gone. Settled down for the rest of the game.

The Stadium
First up the stadium looked real good. The renovations for the World Cup were in place, which reminded me of the fact that barely 20 days before India had won the World Cup in this very place. The gaps between stands ensured the cool evening breeze from the sea. Though it also had the effect of killing most attempts at the Mexican wave. The gaps in the stands ensured that the Waves just broke out in between.

The Seat
Had a seat in the Sachin Tendulkar stand. Located at the "cow corner" for the right handed batsman opposite the pavilion. So any sideways movement of the ball was not visible. But spotting the ball running/flying around the ground wasn't difficult at all. The camera operated on the crane was creating quite a bit of nuisance though. It would often rear itself bang in the middle splitting the view of the pitch. The crane operator was definitely the most abused guy from our stand.

The Crowd
Stadium was packed and filled with blue shirts supporting the Mumbai Indians. A few yellow shirts could be seen here and there though. One of our party turned out be a Chennai Super Kings supporter."Is he a Chennai supporter?" was the query raised by a bunch of teenaged girls seated behind. On getting the answer in affirmative, it was followed by a non-stop hooting to the chants of "Chennai harega" with whistles & horns blasting through out. Personally, suffered some collateral damage as the hearing seemed to be gone for some time.
Have to add this, the crowd was quite well behaved throughout.

The Match
As for the match itself, a good innings by Rohit Sharma, a Michelle for Bhajji and some outstanding fielding throughout helped Mumbai to a 8 run victory. Badrinath played a lone hand for the Chennai Super Kings. And the crowd was happy with the result.

Other Random Thoughts

• Now I have seen our T20 world cup winning hero, Joginder Sharma (a.k.a Sir Jogi) bowl in person. Nothing more to say.
• The 10'o clock rule for loudspeakers was strictly followed. No music after the 10, but the crowd was noisy enough to make up for it.
• Time moves faster in the stadium. The strategic timeouts, gaps between overs, wickets just went by unnoticed.
• Must feel for the section of the crowd, which finds itself in front of a cheerleaders' stand only to find the cheerboys from CSK dancing there.

Overall Experience - Excellent

World Cup Final - One day to go & Arbit Statistics - 6

Its less than 24 hours to go for the final of the 2011 ICC World Cup. It shouldn't get any bigger than this, but given India's last two games, the final seems a bit anti-climatic. In fact there is a worrying lack of nervousness in me regarding the outcome of this game. Here are the thoughts for the match.

• India vs Sri Lanka. The very idea of this fixture is irritating. How many times do these teams have to play each other.
• Sri Lanka has called up Chaminda Vaas (I thought he had retired by now) as injury cover for Angelo Matthews. All the paperwork must be in place for an emergency replacement and proceed efficiently as well. Shouldn't there have been a deadline for such changes?
• For India Ashish Nehra has a broken finger while attempting a catch diving forward. This is what happens when you do things which you are not used to doing.
• If required India should replace Nehra with Joginder Sharma. After all Sir Jogi has been Dhoni's lucky charm (though mostly in the T20 format). And he is a proven winners' medal winner.

Wish for the Match

• SRT scores his 100th international 100 as India wins the game, while Muralitharan signs off with a wicket off his last ball in international cricket (his only wicket though). [Or is this a bit too fairytalish finish? In that case I'll just settle for an Indian victory only]

Arbit Stat for the match

• If India win (and they will win), they would have beaten all the past 4 World Champions in a row in the sequnece in which they became World Champions (West Indies, Australia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka) [Stat courtesy - RameshSrivats on twitter]

India to WIN, Bleeding Blue (the Indian shade, not the Sri Lankan one)

The Semi-Final Preview

The World Cup is at a stage where it is now beyond Prediction Time. As for the quarter-finals predictions, 3 out of 4 successes for me with only the South Africa-New Zealand game going the other way (there I had put in the disclaimer about the South African choke). Now to semi-finals. Or rather THE SEMI-FINAL.

India vs Pakistan at Mohali. The game has already been hyped up beyond just a match. The Prime Ministers are attending (Aside, last time PM Manmohan Singh attended a big match, India lost 8-0 to Australia in the CWG Hockey finals, So I am worried, very worried). People are talking about a national holiday on Wednesday. The whole country is likely to come to a standstill. There is a general sense of nervousness  and anticipation in the air. No one is even thinking beyond this game. So while I try to calm my nerves for the big match, I present here a small compilation of India-Pakistan World Cup highlights as a preview for the match. (All India favoring as we have an AWESOME record in World Cups)

1. The Kiran More - Javed Miandad altercation in 1992

2. Ajay Jadeja's slog overs bash in 1996

3. The Prasad-Sohail encounter in 1996

4. Sachin blasting Shoaib & Waqar in 2003

5. Joginder Sharma bowling the last over to Misbah in the 2007 T20 WC final (Ok it was not an ODI but still a World  Cup only)

6. The bowl out in the weirdest ending ever (from the same T20 WC)

7. The Kanitkar moment in Bangldesh indepence cup (Ok, not a World Cup moment but a great victory moment for Indian fans). This was an example of an entire international career being defined by one memorable shot)

Given the history of the rivalry, God Only Knows what 2011 will provide. But something will linger on definitely.

P.S. In case the match ends in a tie, it will an OOPSE moment for all (Explained in detail here)

Sir Jogi

Joginder Sharma

Player - India, Haryana, Chennai Super Kings

Winners Medal - T20 World Cup (2007), IPL (2010), Champions League (2010)

Joginder Sharma (or Sir Jogi as he is affectionately referred to) will go down in all Indian cricket fans' memories as the person who was entrusted with the job of bowling the last over in the T20 World Cup final. Misbah-ul-Haq somehow managed to get out on the 4th ball and India became the first T20 world champion. Sadly this was the last time Sir Jogi played for India (so far). He went on to represent Chennai Super Kings in the IPL(Irony - this is a team from which many players went on to represent India but Sir Jogi went out of the nationalsquad). He went on to get the IPL winners medal, though was dropped in the later stages of the tournament. And now has the Champions League winners medal (without playing a single game).

Thus Sir Jogi is now the most decorated Indian T20 player (alongwith Dhoni) with 3 winners medals (Aside - between them Sachin, Dravid, Ganguly & Kumble have none. So now we know whom to select to have a better chance of winning the tournament :P)