Remember the game

In April 2016, Carlos Brathwaite struck four successive sixes to help West Indies win the World T20 in Kolkata. I wanted to recreate the final over by speaking to some of those who were at Eden Gardens.

Excerpt from the piece published in The Cricket Monthly:

At 11 minutes past ten o'clock on a steamy Sunday night in Kolkata, as Daren Sammy carved a ball straight into the gullet of the deep-point fielder, leaving his team wobbling at 107 for 6… as the bowler David Willey broke into the "Champion" jive… as Samuel Badree, slotted to bat at No. 10, regretted that his team had "given the game away" with three wickets in ten balls… as a boisterous Eden Gardens crowd willed the game on to a dramatic finish… as Ian Bishop thought back to the 2012 World T20 final in Colombo, another time the odds were against West Indies, when he had still given them a better chance than he did now… 27-year-old Carlos Brathwaite, playing his eighth T20 international, glanced around the dugout.

"And for a short moment everyone was looking around and wondering who should go in next - myself or Denesh Ramdin."

Brathwaite does not pause at this recall. The moment's hesitation seems unremarkable to him.

The indecision came from his deep respect for Ramdin, he says, a senior figure playing his 58th T20I, known for manoeuvring tight chases with "cricket smarts". As his captain, Sammy, trudged off the outfield into the dugout, Brathwaite asked himself if it was better for Ramdin to play out the next ten balls - "to stop the procession of wickets" - or for him to go in and attack all out. The asking rate was creeping up towards 11. Someone had to make the call.

…

Read the full piece here.