Gautam Gambhir- When the Man of Crisis almost saved India’s day-
It was the Commonwealth Bank Series of 2008. India was facing Australia in a high voltage group clash.
Australia skipper R. T. Ponting won the toss and elected to bat first,on what appeared to be a flat SCG pitch.
A magnificent 124 from Punter,supported by attacking fifties from Matt Hayden and Andrew Symonds(Roy) pummelled the Aussie total to 317/7 in the stipulated 50 overs.
Chasing this total,India were off to a shaky start,having lost openers V. Sehwag and S. R. Tendulkar cheaply. No. 4 batter R. G. Sharma and star all-rounder Yuvraj Singh too failed to impress,as India were reduced to a precarious 51 for 4 in 10.2 overs.
But one man was looking absolutely calm and cool- Gautam Gambhir.
He tried to forge a partnership with skipper M. S. Dhoni.
As Dhoni was playing an extremely slow knock on that day(36 off 66 balls),Gambhir had to take up the role of the attacker.
If a batsman plays 11 full overs himself,and scores only 36 runs in those,then I guess you guys can well understand how high the required run rate becomes,especially when your team is chasing a 300+ total. And simultaneously,it puts a lot of pressure on the batter who’s batting alongside you.
Whatever,Dhoni’s struggle was finally ended by Lee,as he edged one to the keeper.
Finally,Gambhir found an able ally in the form of R. V. Uthappa.
They shared a quickfire 69 run stand in just 52 balls. But the required run rate had gone very very high by then.
Gautam Gambhir,the dashing Gautam Gambhir scored 113 off just 119 balls,with the help of 9 sweetly timed 4s and 1 huge 6. He reached his 100 off 109 balls.
Unfortunately,trying to up the anté,he stepped out of his crease,and misread a very ordinary delivery from Brad Hogg. He was stumped!!😑
After his dismissal,India collapsed completely.
Uthappa continued to heave mighty blows,while I. Pathan and Harbhajan too contributed small cameos,but those weren’t enough to chase down 317.
India ended on 299,handing Australia an 18 run win.
However,the match could have had a different result,had so many balls not been wasted by a single batsman in the middle overs.
Whatever,this innings of Gambhir was a great knock. Unfortunately,it ended in an unfortunate stump out.
Scorecard-
Apologies- I couldn’t find an image of the toss of this match. Hence I had to enclose an image of the toss of the CWC 2011 Quarter final clash. My heartiest apologies for the inconvenience.