Robin Uthappa, MS Dhoni, and S Sreesanth were a part of the Indian team in 2007 and also featured in the Playing XI that won the 2007 T20 World Cup in South Africa. Throughout his cricket career pace merchant S Sreesanth came across as an aggressive cricketer who was known for his animated character on and off the cricket field. 

However, Uthappa believes that former Indian captain MS Dhoni was the only one who handled Sreesanth. In an interaction, Robin revealed a hilarious incident when during a match MS told Sreesanth to focus on his bowling rather than other useless elements. The incident panned out when Australia was up against India in a T20I match in Hyderabad just after the 2007 T20 World Cup. 

Explaining the entire episode in detail, Uthappa revealed that Sreesanth was preparing to bowl and he stopped his run-up mid-way to uproot the stumps of an Australian batter who was backing up. “It was just after the World Cup, and we were playing Australia in Hyderabad. And I think it was either Andrew Symonds or Hussey who had backed up. 

“And then Sree (Sreesanth) stopped, took the stumps off, and goes ‘How is that? How is that?’ So MS came running from there, pulled him, and said ‘just go, bowl bro’. Someone who actually handled him really well was MS,” Uthappa told stand-up comedian Sorabh Pant on his YouTube show ‘Wake Up With Sorabh’.

You don’t lose a World Cup final to Pakistan: Robin Uthappa

Further in the interaction, Robin Uthappa revealed the emotions he went through while playing the final against Pakistan during the 2007 T20 World Cup. Pakistan lost their nine wickets by 19.2 overs and needed six runs off the last four balls with Misbah-ul-Haq on the strike. 

The third ball of the final over by Joginder Sharma saw Misbah hititng the ball in the air and Sreesanth, who was standing at short fine-leg, easily completed the catch to secure a win. Speaking about his feelings Robin explained that when the ball was in the air, he was only praying for Sreesanth to take the catch as he didn’t want India to lose against Pakistan.

“I was standing at long-on. So many things happened during that match. When that ball went in the air, my first thought was ‘ok, who is at short fine leg?’. And when I saw it’s Sree, I started sprinting and I was praying ‘Please pull us through.’ Because again, you don’t lose a World Cup final to Pakistan. There’s just something that we always get the better of them in a World Cup,” said Uthappa.

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