Piyush Chawla has won the 2007 World T20 and 2011 World Cup with the Indian team and once was looked like a child prodigy for the country making his India Test debut as a teenager. His biggest claim to fame was dismissing the great Sachin Tendulkar as a 16-year-old in a 2005-06 Challenger Trophy match.
The young legspinner bamboozled the legendary batsman with a wrong one from around the stumps, breaking through his defense. A year later, Chawla even made his debut for India. Chawla talked about the same dismissal and whether he was jittery to bowl to perhaps the greatest Indian batsman.
"As a 15-16-year-old, when you are going to bowl at Sachin paaji, only two things are possible: you are either very nervous or very relaxed. Luckily I was very relaxed. The reason behind that was my thinking that even if Sachin paaji hits me, how does that matter? If a man, who has taken the likes of Shane Warne, Muralitharan, and Glenn McGrath to the cleaners, hits me as well, that’s not a big thing,” he said.
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“I was just enjoying the ‘Oh I am bowling to Sachin paaji’ feeling," Chawla said during the chat show Homerun with Arun Venugopal on his YouTube channel.
Talking about how he got Sachin out, Chawla said, “On that particular one, I don’t know what exactly happened. When I started off from my run-up, that too bowling inside the field restrictions, I thought I will bowl a normal leg spin from the leg stump going away from him. To be very honest, I still don’t know – it’s almost 16 years now. I don’t know what came to my mind and I just bowled a wrong ‘un."
However, the very next year in the same tournament, Sachin got his revenge as he smashed the youngster all over the Chennai ground.
"People remember that I had got Paaji out in that fashion. Paaji, too, isn’t a man who forgets things quickly. The very next year, again in a Challenger Trophy game in Chennai, Paaji smashed me around for 20 runs in my first over! That’s what I was saying: if Paaji hits me around, it’s not a big deal. Paaji has smashed so many bowlers, which is why people don’t remember this (20-run over)," said Chawla.
Piyush Chawla has played three Tests, 25 ODIs and 7 T20Is for India and is currently with the Chennai Super Kings franchise in the Indian Premier League (IPL).
