September 25, 2007 – The Cricketers believeTwenty20 cricket is batsman’s game and not of the bowlers but India has proved otherwise in their final match, which they played with Pakistan. Pakistan, in fact, played superbly well in Johannesburg but the Indian Bowlers beat them at the last over by 5 runs at the Wanderers ground and became the world champion: International Reporter.

India's score of 157 runs for five wickets from its allocation of 20 six-ball overs looked inadequate on a ground where teams batting first averaged 185. Its captain, Mahendra Singh Donhi, had said, on choosing to bat first, that he wanted a score of at least 180.

Superb bowling by India's left-arm quick bowlers Irfan Pathan, who took three wickets for 16 runs to win the Man of the Match award, and Rudra Singh, who took three wickets for 26, meant that Pakistan fell five short, losing their final wicket in their last over for 152.

A magnificent contest between cricket's fiercest rivals showed the new format at its best. There was ferocious hitting and intelligent and spectacular bowling without a single dull or inconsequential moment from the first ball, when India's opening batsman, Yusuf Pathan, playing his first international match at the age of 24, came close to being run out before he had received a single delivery.

The huge smile on the face of Malcolm Speed, chief executive of the game's ruling body, the International Cricket Council, underlined the difference between this and the World Cup played under the longer-established 50- over-a-side format earlier this year in the West Indies.
That ended in farce and near-darkness as the players of Australia and Sri Lanka were forced to play out meaningless overs by match officials ignorant of the rules they were supposed to be enforcing.

This finished with both teams in contention until the final over, and an ecstatic lap of honor by Indian players hailed by a vast contingent of compatriots in the capacity 32,000 crowd. India is the first Twenty20 champion, but certainly not the last.

The contrast was particularly strong for the two finalists. Each had retreated early from a West Indies team humiliated by defeat against unrated opponents. India lost to Bangladesh while Pakistan fell to Ireland. Here, though, they showed a resolve, initiative and athleticism in the field that were lacking earlier this year.

It was a particularly significant moment for India, which went into the tournament without any of the superstars - the batsmen Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Saurav Ganguly and Vangipuruppu Laxman, and the spin-bowler Anil Kumble - who have dominated its cricket for the past decade.

honi's success in inspiring a young team underlined his case for taking on the captaincy of the full five-day team - currently vacant - as well as the one-day leadership he has already been awarded.

The two teams had already produced the tournament's most thrilling climax in the pool stages - a tied game forcing a resort to a bowl-out, cricket's answer to soccer's penalty shootout. Here they were just as well matched

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