There is an old saying in cricket “it’s not over until it’s over”. However, some cricketers forget it at times and start celebrating thinking that the game is in their reach now and can’t go away.
Cricket is a funny, old game and it has often been seen that the result of the game has turned upside down after the premature celebrations of the cricketers.
Here are 5 hilarious premature celebrations in cricket:
Mushfiqur Rahim (2016 T20 World Cup):
It was a do-or-die game for Bangladesh against India and Mushfiqur Rahim almost turned the tide in their favor by hitting two boundaries in the last over, bringing the equation down to 2 off 3 balls.
After Mushfiqur hit the second boundary, he pumped his fist thinking he would get the job done now, but as it turned out, Bangladesh lost three wickets on the next three balls and lost the game.
Herschelle Gibbs (1999 ODI World Cup):
Herschelle Gibbs dropped the Australian captain Steve Waugh in a group game in the 1999 World Cup which proved to be extremely expensive for South Africa as Waugh went on to score a hundred.
Gibbs dropped the catch because he was in a hurry to celebrate before gaining full control of the ball. He had the ball in his hands, but in his attempt to throw it up in the air, he fumbled and the ball hit the ground.
Suresh Raina (IPL 2009):
Suresh Raina was on his way to his first IPL hundred in 2009 against Rajasthan Royals when he hit a boundary against Munaf Patel to go from 94 to 98. However, Raina mistook that shot for a six and started celebrating his hundred.
The television footage later showed that it was actually a boundary and Raina remained two short of the hundred. To Raina’s bad luck, he lost his wicket immediately after that at the score of 98 only.
Ravichandran Ashwin (Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy 2019):
Tamil Nadu required 13 off the last over to win the Syed Mushtaq Trophy final against Karnataka. Ravichandran Ashwin was on strike for Tamil Nadu and he also went through a scenario which was pretty much like that of Mushfiqur Rahim.
Ashwin, just like Rahim, hit a couple of boundaries and thought the job was almost done with just 5 needed off the next 4 balls. However, Ashwin lost the strike off the very next ball and never got the strike back as his teammates didn’t manage to get the required 5 runs.
Asela Gunaratne (T20I against South Africa in 2017):
Asela Gunaratne uprooted the stumps and started running towards the dressing room after hitting a boundary in the last over of a T20I game against South Africa.
Everyone was surprised because the match was still unfinished. Sri Lanka actually needed 5 runs to win that game against South Africa, but Gunaratne thought there were just 4 runs needed.
Gunaratne’s batting partner later let him know that he would have to score one more run to take Sri Lanka over the line. Gunaratne, however, finished off the game for Sri Lanka on the next ball itself.
