'Just Bowl, Bro' - Robin Uthappa Recalls Hilarious Incident Involving MS Dhoni and S Sreesanth

S Sreesanth was a popular name in Indian cricket before his career was put to a halt due to the spot-fixing scandal. During his playing days, Sreesanth shared a great bonding with then captain MS Dhoni and the pacer has often credited the former captain for backing him in the initial days of his career. Now, India’s veteran opening batsman Robin Uthappa has revealed a hilarious incident that panned out between Dhoni and Sreesanth in 2007.

After India scripted history by lifting the ICC World Cup in 2007, they hosted the Australian side for a T20I match in Hyderabad. Speaking about that particular game, Uthappa revealed that the Australian batsman was backing up at the non-striker’s end when Sreesanth was preparing to bowl a delivery. However, the pacer abruptly ended his run-up and uprooted the stumps since the batter was not in the crease.

Though Sreesanth demanded to declare the batsman as out, Dhoni, who was standing behind the wickets, walked to the pacer and told him to just focus on his bowling. “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,” Uthappa said.

“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’.

Further in the interaction, Uthappa revisited the golden memories of India lifting the trophy in the inaugural edition of the T20 World Cup. India were playing against Pakistan in the final and Uthappa marched back to the pavilion after scoring just eight runs off 11 deliveries. By 19.3 overs, Pakistan was reeling at 152 and needed just six runs more for the victory.

However, India needed just one wicket as Pakistan had lost their nine wickets. On the fourth ball of the last over Misbah-Ul-Haq tried to play an aerial scoop of Joginder Sharma, but ended up skying the ball to a short fine leg, where Sreesanth completed the catch. Explaining his feelings during the catch, Uthappa revealed that while he was standing at long on he was just praying for Sreesanth to complete the catch as one wouldn’t want to lose against Pakistan in the final.

Get all the IPL news and Cricket Score here

• 2007 t20 world cup
• MS Dhoni
• robin uthappa
• S Sreesanth