Rishabh Pant's injury break helped India get wicket of Heinrich Klaasen to turn the tide for India.
Rishabh Pant spoke in detail about his injury during the tense phase of the final of the T20 World Cup 2024 against South Africa in Barbados on June 29.
India won the T20 World Cup with a thrilling seven-run win over South Africa in a spectacular final at Kensington Oval. Pant's use of mind games is unique in that it frequently combines comedy and pressure methods.
South Africa needed 30 runs in 30 balls to win their maiden ICC title. Then Rishabh Pant suffered a tweaked knee and India physio ran onto the field to check him out. This brought some much-needed break in the proceedings as Heinrich Klaasen and David Mmiller were hammering sixes and fours for fun.
The break proved to be beneficial for India, as Klaasen got out the very next ball and in the end, India went on to win their second T20 World Cup.
During a recent TV program, India captain Rohit Sharma revealed that Pant purposefully paused the T20 World Cup final to disrupt South Africa's momentum.
Pant now reveals what transpired during the final on a Star Sports chat program.
"I actually thinking about what to do because the momentum had suddenly shifted (in South Africa's favour), they had scored plenty of runs in 2-3 overs, so I was thinking when will that moment come when we will the World Cup final,” Pant said on Star Sports.
As the video of Pant getting treatment from the Team India physio played in the background screen, Pant said, "I was asking the physio to take time, when he asked if my knee is fine I said, 'Bhaiya, main testing kar raha tha'. Sometimes you have to do these types of things in matches, I'm not saying it works every time, but it does work sometimes and if it works at that kind of a moment, then nothing like it."
Here is the video: