India鈥檚 ODI captain Rohit Sharma has revealed what was going on in his mind when Rishabh Pant went down with an injury in the T20 World Cup final last year, saying that while initially he thought that the injury he sustained from the accident might have relapsed, only to realise it was a tactic.
The Rohit Sharma-led side lifted the T20 World Cup in Barbados after a last-over victory over South Africa.
One of the most told stories about the World Cup victory over South Africa was how Pant faked an injury to break the latter鈥檚 momentum in the chase, which was followed by Heinrich Klaasen鈥檚 game-changing wicket.
鈥淲hen South Africa needed 30 runs off 30 balls, just before that, there was a small break. Pant used his intelligence to pause the game, he had a knee injury, so he had his knee taped, which helped slow down the game, because the game was fast-paced and at that moment, all a batter wants is the ball to be bowled quickly,鈥 Rohit had said after the World Cup.
In a fresh claim made on the incident, Rohit said that he felt Pant was injured. He felt that Pant had hurt his knee, which had suffered a blow in the tragic car accident three years back.
鈥淪ee, Hardik has come to bowl there. So, we were discussing with Hardik what to do. I didn鈥檛 know what had happened before. I genuinely thought that something had happened to him,鈥 Rohit said while speaking on Star Sports.
鈥淭he accident he had, I thought he was just trying to. But actually, it was just to stop the game a little bit. The momentum was with them. So, it was very important to break that,鈥 Rohit added.
Klaasen was in complete control of the chase, with South Africa requiring 26 off the last 24 deliveries. A well-set David Miller was at the crease as well. Soon after, Pant was seen lying on the ground, and a physio ran in to tend to him.
When play resumed after the short delay, Pandya removed Klaasen before ace India pacer Jasprit Bumrah got rid of Marco Jansen with an inswinger that would get most top-order batters out.