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| West Indies team celebrate after Carlos Brathwaite hit the winning shot |
2016 can now be described as the year of West Indies cricket. Their Under 19, Women's and Men's teams are all world champions now. Darren Sammy's team showed the world that they are not a one-man team and every player is a potential match winner.
Marlon Samuels was also the hero in 2012 and he did it again today with some great hitting in the end from Carlos Brathwaite. I have always felt that Samuels is a highly underrated batsman who never gets his due. I hope it will change after today. Today, I am sure he would have silenced his 'good friend' Shane Warne. West Indies have a new star in Brathwaite. Few people know that he is a very good lower middle order Test batsman as well.
Sammy himself didn't do much with the ball or bat throughout this tournament but showed that a player be in a team merely as a specialist captain. No one but Sammy could have kept this bunch together. In 2014 when the Windies were eliminated because of rain, Sammy had said that God wanted Sanga and Mahela to win the world cup and his prophecy turned out to be true. At the onset of this tournament, no one gave this team a chance. Experts like Mark Nicholas ridiculed them, their own board didn't support them. But today these 15 Caribbean players have certainly proved everyone wrong, perhaps even fading the line between man and myth.
West Indies needed 19 runs needed to win of the final over. Carlos Brathwaite was up to the task and struck 4 humongous 6s of the first 4 deliveries of the 20th over bowled by Ben Stokes to seal the match.
PS. Virat Kohli deservedly won is the man of the tournament.
- Murtaza Ali Khan
