Former Pakistan all-rounder Shoaib Malik has claimed that in the 2007 India-Pakistan World T20 final, MS Dhoni’s senior bowlers refused to bowl the final over to Misbah-Ul-Haq.
In the inaugural edition of the tournament in 2007 which was played in South Africa, MS Dhoni-led India met Pakistan, captained by Shoaib Malik in the final at Johannesburg. MS Dhoni won the toss and chose to bat first.
Thanks to 75 by Gautam Gambhir and 30* in 16 balls from Rohit Sharma, India posted 157/5 in 20 overs. Umar Gul picked 3/28 for Pakistan.
In reply, the match went right down to the wire, as after India reduced Pakistan to 104/7 in 16 overs, Misbah Ul Haq changed the course of the game with his brutal hitting as Harbhajan Singh went for 3 sixes in the 17th over and then Sohail Tanvir hit Sreesanth for two sixes before falling to him on the last ball of the 18th over.
RP Singh bowled the important 19th over and gave just 7 runs while picking up the wicket of Umar Gul, leaving Pakistan 13 runs to get from the last over.
Talking about the same, Shoaib Malik said on the A Sports show ‘Tha Pavilion’: “I will not take names. Each of India’s main bowlers had one over left. Dhoni asked everyone, but they refused to bowl the last over. They were afraid to bowl to Misbah. He was hitting all over the ground.
People always talk about that scoop shot by Misbah. I am telling you, If it was not the last wicket, he must have hit him down the ground. He had already hit Joginder for a big six in that over.”
With RP Singh, Irfan Pathan, and Sreesanth having bowled their quota of 4 overs each and Harbhajan Singh giving away 19 runs in his 3rd over, MS Dhoni went with medium pacer Joginder Sharma as his option for the last over against Misbah Ul Haq.
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After hitting the second ball of the over for a six, on the next ball, Misbah played that unfortunate scoop shot to the leg side where he was caught by Sreesanth on the short fine-leg and Pakistan lost the final by 5 runs, making India the first-ever T20 World Cup champions.
Misbah explained the reason behind playing that scoop shot against Joginder Sharma in the last over.
“That was the shot I was playing throughout the tournament. The plan was to get a boundary and then we will need one run to level the score; they will bring the field up and then I will finish the match. I am not an emotional guy, but the final loss got the better of me. We were a step ahead from the rest of the teams. We dominated the 2007 World Cup team. Unfortunately, we couldn’t win the final,” he said.
Pakistan did win the T20 World Cup in England in the 2009 edition, beating Sri Lanka in the final.
