A few days ago, the Central government issued revised guidelines for Lockdown 5.0 and the reopening of activities outside containment zones across India. Although, no such plan has been released in actions related to cricket. Meanwhile, cricketers are sharing and recalling the memorable moments of their playing days.
Recently, India’s frontline Test bowler Ishant Sharma has revealed that his teammate KL Rahul had once challenged him to score more runs than him in a Test inning. Ishant spill the beans during a conversation with Mayank Agarwal for BCCI. Ishant reminisced Rahul’s reaction after the speedster hit his maiden Test fifty against West Indies in Jamaica last year.
The Test match that Ishant talked about took place in August last year where Rahul scored 13 in the first innings and then challenged Ishant whether he can surpass his score. Rahul said that if Ishant can do that, then he would do all kinds of favours for him. Later, the pacer not only bettered Rahul’s score but also smashed his first Test fifty.
During the chat with Mayank, Ishant was quizzed to reveal his teammates’ reaction after he scored fifty. Ishant said Rahul had joked that the Indian team would have jumped off the balcony if the pacer scored a Test century in that match.
“Forget everyone’s reaction. Ask KL, how he felt about me scoring a fifty. He said ‘we were thinking if he scores a hundred, we would have to jump off from the balcony’,” said Ishant.
Ishant added: “KL scored some 25-26 runs (he had actually scored 13 runs) and he said ‘son, if you score more than me, I will do this and that for you’.”
The 31-year old stated that after scoring the half-ton, he gave some batting tips to Rahul. To which the Karnataka batsman appealed not to tease him more.
“After I scored a half-century, I gave him some batting advice, and he was like ‘Stop it, bro, you scored fifty and ab meri jaan kha raha hai (and now you are teasing me). My batting gloves got wet for the 1st time. Rahul gave me a pair of new gloves with which I batted in that innings. He was like ‘I should have batted with these gloves, and then I could also have scored a fifty’,” Ishant added further.
In that contest, Ishant played a phenomenal knock of 57 off 80 balls with seven boundaries in order to help his team reach in a commanding position. During the game, Ishant had also shared a crucial partnership of 112 with middle-order batsman Hanuma Vihari. The Delhi-born paceman even picked up three wickets to help India register a memorable victory by 257 runs.
