Winning 2011 World Cup at par with 2001 Test series triumph against Australia, reveals Harbhajan Singh
Veteran off-spinner Harbhajan Singh recalled India's famous Test series win against Australia back in 2001 and also the 2011 World Cup triumph in a candid chat with former Indian opener Aakash Chopra.
The offspinner revealed that for him both the Test series triumph as well as the World Cup win were of equal importance as both changed the landscape of Indian cricket.
“As a player, I will rate 2001 series against Australia at the top spot as it made me the player I am today. If I recall my childhood dream, I always wanted to win the World Cup and it came true in 2011 so I will keep it at par with the 2001 series,” Harbhajan Singh said on Aakash Chopra's YouTube channel.
Steve Waugh's Australian team were on a rampage and considered India as the final frontier. Having dominated everywhere in the world, Australia made a fabulous start to the 2001 series by comprehensively winning the first Test in Mumbai. The second Test in Kolkata too was dominated by Australia for the first three days with India being on the back foot for large swathes after being asked to follow-on.
But this is where VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid stood up for the team. They batted together for a whole day and put India in a position to ask Australia to bat again. In the last innings, Harbhajan Singh picked up the wickets required as India completed an unbelievabe victory. India went on to win the next Test in Chennai to win the series 2-1 and complete what was probably the most important series win on home soil in recent memory.
Winning the T20 World Cup in 2007 was unbelievable: Harbhajan Singh
Back in 2007, BCCI sent a very young and inexperienced Indian team to South Africa for the inaugural edition of the T20 World Cup. Perhaps the lack of expectations made India fearless under the new leadership of Mahendra Singh Dhoni.
Harbhajan Singh revealed that it was an unbelievable feeling to win the T20 World Cup as the heroes' welcome that the team received when they landed back in India was breath-taking.
“Winning the T20 World Cup in 2007 was unbelievable. When we landed back in India, we got a huge amount of support, I had never seen anything like that before. I would not be able to rate these three moments as all are very special to me,” Harbhajan Singh concluded.