I Said Don't Give it to Bowlers: Virender Sehwag Reveals Important Advise He Gave to MS Dhoni During IND vs PAK in 2007 T20 WC

Former India opener Virender Sehwag walked down memory lane and recalled the memories of the iconic bowl-out against Pakistan in the 2007 T20 World Cup. The two arch-rivals faced each other in the group stage of the inaugural T20 WC where the match ended in a tie after both team’s innings. With no introduction of Super over, bowl-out decided the winner of the mega clash.

Sehwag was one of the players from India who hit the stumps during bowl-out. The Men in Blue used their resources well in bowl-out as skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni chose the spinners to get the job done. Apart from Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh and Robin Uthappa rolled their arms and hit the timber. The Pakistan players failed to hit the wickets as India had to use just three bowlers in the deciding event.

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Meanwhile, Sehwag has suggested that he advised Dhoni to not use the bowlers in the bowl-out as they might miss the target with the long run-up.

“So the very first match ended up in a bowl-out. I told MS (Dhoni) that I’ll be going first. I said I will do it as I was confident of hitting. I said don’t give it to the bowlers. He asked why so? I said they’ll mess up with their run-up,” Sehwag told renowned anchor and host Gaurav Kapur on his famous show ‘Breakfast with Champions’.

Sehwag said they practised bowl-out in the warm-ups which helped India in the crunch situation

“It happened since we all had practiced in the warm-ups. So they got used to the bowl-out. I don’t know of the other teams,” he added.

While the legendary opener also suggested that then-coaches Venkatesh Prasad and Robin Singh advised the players to practise it in warm-ups.

“About the bowl-out, we would go for our warm-ups… Then it was a new rule to be used as a tie-breaker. We were like, ‘How will a tie happen? That too in T20Is?’

“Still, Venkatesh Prasad and Robin Singh… They would say for warm-ups, everyone take a ball and hit the wickets. Let’s see who hits the most. The batsmen in the team were hitting the target more often. I, Suresh Raina, Robin Uthappa, and Rohit Sharma,” he added.