As it happened, Dhani was one of the first players he ran into after the celebration, and the two shared a sweet moment. Laughter and animated happy faces.
The coolest moment, however, occurred after the third ball of the final over. He’d just moved outside leg stump and attempted to smash it through the off side, but he couldn’t beat the infield. He then turned to face Karthik, closed his eyes, and nodded his head – the Indian way of saying all is well, hum hain na, it’s all cool, nothing to worry about.
For India, short is sweet.
If a pace bowler makes an impact in an India-Pakistan match, conventional wisdom suggests it will be through toe-crushing yorkers or lateral movement testing both edges of the bat.
Short-pitched stuff isn’t commonly used in these matches, particularly in Asian matches. Even an Indian bowling attack missing Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Shami proved too hot for the Pakistan batsmen. Avesh Khan is known for his quickness, but Bhuvneshwar Kumar and rookie Arshdeep Singh are not. All of them, however, had great success by digging the ball into a surprisingly responsive Dubai pitch.
