New Delhi: Former India allrounder Irfan Pathan has said Pakistan were not prepared for the bowl-out which was played between the two teams during the 2007 inaugural World T20 Group D match after the game was tied.
Bowl-out
India won the bowl-out and eventually went on to beat Pakistan in the final to clinch the title.
“Pakistan’s captain accepted it in one of the press conferences that they didn’t know about the bowl-out,” Irfan said on a special Watch Along of the 2007 ICC World T20 between India and Pakistan on Star Sports network and Disney+ Hotstar.
“When the time for bowl-out arrived, they were not sure if they should be taking full run-ups or a half run-ups. On the other hand, we came in prepared for the bowl-out and the result was quite evident. There was no competition between the two teams,” he added.
Robin Uthappa
Robin Uthappa added: “Before every practice, we used to play a game after warm-up, so what Venky (Venkatesh Prasad) did was instead of playing football, he said let’s play bowl out (batsman vs bowlers). Among the batsmen, Sehwag, Rohit and me (Robin) used to get a hit very often. So, when this match (10th Match, ICC World Twenty20 at Durban, Group D) got tied, we were very excited and jubilant to be very honest because it was a match we almost lost and we managed to tie it.
“If you go and look at the game, it was a losing game, Sreesanth bowled really well and we tied the game. Once we tied the game, emotions were very high and so was our confidence.
Credit to Dhoni
“I have to give credit to MS Dhoni at that point of time. At a very young age in his first tournament and his first game as captain, a guy went up to him, his teammate went up to him saying, who is a non-bowler and is not his main skill, went up to him and said “I have to bowl and Ia¿m going to hit the stumps” and I swear he (Dhoni) didn’t even bat an eyelid and said ok bowl,” said Uthappa.