The T20 World Cup 2007 was the very first ICC event in the 20-over format which saw India winning the tournament under new captain MS Dhoni. This victory was the reason which led to the conceptualization of the Indian Premier League and the T20 boom.
India had met arch-rivals Pakistan twice in the tournament and apart from the final, which was an exciting match, they also clashed in the group game, which saw the very first bowl-out scenario in the T20 World Cup history as the match ended in a tie.
Today, September 14, is the 15th anniversary of the said bowl out between India and Pakistan in Durban. India had batted first and thanks to 50 from Robin Uthappa, posted 141/9 in 20 overs as Mohammad Asif took 4/18.
In reply, Pakistan came very close to winning the match thanks to 53 from Misbah-Ul-Haq, but he was run out on the last ball when one run was needed to win and the match ended up in the first tied encounter of the tournament.
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Many would remember that during the early ages of the T20 format, a tied match was resolved with a bowl out instead of the super over which is used today. In the bowl out, five players from either side were nominated to bowl one ball at three exposed stumps, and the team to get the most hits won the bowl out and the points.
That day for India, Virender Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh, and Robin Uthappa were right on the money and struck the stumps. While Yasir Arafat, Umar Gul, and Shahid Afridi all missed for Pakistan and India won the bowl-out with a 3-0 lead.
Recently in a video that has gone viral on social media, MS Dhoni can be seen and heard talking about the bowl-out preparation for the T20 World Cup 2007 and he revealed that all players were asked to go through this exercise of hitting exposed stumps before or after practice.
He said that he wanted everyone to be prepared for a tied match scenario and also said that he picked the players who had the most success at hitting the stumps during practice for the bowl-out against Pakistan.
“There was something that was very particular about that T20 World Cup and bowl out was one of the things. And before that we had never practiced bowl out. So whenever we went for practice we started it off with a bowl out.
Whether it is before the warm-up or after the warm-up because we knew we may need a situation where we may have to do a bowl out if it’s a tie. We made it very clear, it may be for fun but whoever hits the wickets most number of times, they will be the one who will be used when the situation arises,” Dhoni said in the video.
He further stated that the bowl out didn’t mean that it was a bowler’s thing as people who had shown a good fit were preferred.
“It has nothing to do with ‘I am a bowler, this is my job, I will do.’ I was like ‘no.’ Again it’s a performance thing, we will like to keep doing it every day and whoever has the best hit ratio will be the one who will be used.
We started it that way and we never realized actually that in the first few games itself against that Pakistan game, there will be a bowl out session,” he added.
Here is the video:
