Olonga's last over heroics against India

A lot was expected from India in the 1999 World Cup hosted in England since it was exactly 16 years ago that Kapil's devils took the cricketing circuit by storm by winning their maiden trophy at Lords. Moreover, with Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid at the top and with Anil Kumble, Javagal Srinath and Venkatesh Prasad manning the bowling department, gave the Indian fans enough reason to believe that India had a realistic chance to repeat history. 

But unfortunately the clock did not turn back and India had a poor tournament, with the lowest point being its loss to Zimbabwe in their second group game. India were coming into the match on the back of a close loss to South Africa, while Zimbabwe outclassed minnows Kenya in their first group encounter. Thus, India needed a win to stay put in the tournament and it was thought that India would sail past the Zimbabweians.

But, a pre-match jolt to India in the form of Sachin's absence, who had to dash to India to perform his father's last rites, was a crucial factor that bore an outcome to the match. Batting first at Leicester, Zimbabwe posted a formidable 252/9 riding on impressive performances from the Flower brothers. Andy Flower's 68 and Grant Flower's 45 was instrumental in Zimbabwe's pursuit to reach the 250 mark. 

In reply, India failed to get a good start and Zimbabwe's opening bowler's-Heath Streak and Neil Johnson reduced India to 56/3 in 9 overs. Moreover, India were docked 4 overs due to a slow over-rate and it compounded the problems. However, Sadagoppan Ramesh scored a gritty fifty, before Robin Singh and Nayan Mongia batted positively to take India closer. Needing 9 runs off 2 overs, Henry Olonga was given the charge to do the miracle and he responded brilliantly by scalping India's all remaining 3 wickets to hand Zimbabwe a stunning win.

Abhishek De