OTD| Sri Lanka registered dominant win over India in World T20 Final in 2014

This article will discuss On This Day Sri Lanka registered a dominant win over India in the World T20 Final in 2014. India hasn’t got an ICC trophy since winning. India hasn’t got their hands on an ICC trophy since winning the 2013 Champions Trophy in England under the leadership of MS Dhoni. In the last 11 years, India have got close to winning several ICC championships but haven’t been able to cross the line in all the instances.  

On one hand, where One-day Internationals and Test cricket have been the strongest suits of India, the T20 is one format where the Indian team has lagged in the last few years. After winning the inaugural edition of the T20 World Cup in 2014 and having the biggest cricketing league in the world in the form of IPL, India has still haven’t been able to crack the code of T20s.  

The last instance when India got close to winning a T20 World Cup, was on 6th April 2014 when India faced Sri Lanka in the finals of the 2014 T20 World Cup in Bangladesh. It was on this day when Sri Lanka registered a triumphant 6 wicket win over India to lift their first T20 World Cup title under the leadership of Lasith Malinga. 

Sri Lanka’s bowling heroics restricted India to 130/4 

Sri Lanka after winning the toss put India into bat. India lost the wicket of Ajinkya Rahane early but Rohit and Kohli steadied the innings. Once Rohit Sharma got out on 29, Yuvraj entered the field with the but looked completely out of sorts for whatever time he was there on the crease.  

Yuvraj Singh sucked the momentum out of the Indian innings and Virat Kohli was left stranded on the non-striker’s end for the majority part of the death overs. Lasith Malinga and Nuwan Kulasekara displayed a death bowling masterclass and bowled perfect wide Yorkers to which Indian stalwarts like MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli had answers. India’s innings were halted for 130 runs in their quota of 20 overs. 

Sri Lanka’s historic run-chase 

With a target of 131 runs, it looked like an easy run-chase for Sri Lanka, but they also lost the early wicket of Kusal Perera cheaply. Sri Lanka chose a steady approach towards the targets and despite losing some wickets in the middle overs, they chased down the target easily with 6 wickets left and 13 balls to spare.  

It was with this win that Sri Lanka avenged their 2011 ODI World Cup loss against the same opposition in Mumbai. It was a fitting end to the Sri Lanka World Cup curse as before winning the 2014 T20 World Cup final, they lost in the 2007 ODI World Cup, 2009 T20 World Cup, 2011 ODI World Cup, and 2012 T20 World Cup.