India are 22/4. Virat Kohli and Sanju Samson have registered golden ducks. Afghanistan are on top. India's woes batting first have been exposed, not for the first time. Criticism has just begun on social media and India are staring at a shocking, first-ever defeat to Afghanistan in the shortest format. This is when India's new hero for the last 12 months or so, Rinku Singh steps out to the middle and joins hands with Rohit Sharma. The former is given out lbw soon but reverses the call on DRS and then what happens next will forever be remembered in India's rich cricketing history.
It was a crazy day at the Chinnaswamy Stadium as the duo of Rohit and Rinku went berserk in the second half of the innings. The score that looked impossible to go beyond 140 at one stage reached 212 runs by the time the innings ended. Rohit Sharma had smashed his fifth T20I century, most in T20Is and Rinku had come up with yet another knock that had bailed the team out of trouble. Both players had scored runs at a strike-rate of 175.36 and 176.92 respectively.
After losing their fourth wicket in the 5th over, India didn't lose a single wicket for rest of the 87 balls as Rohit Sharma and Rinku Singh added a record 190 runs for the fifth wicket. It turned out to be the highest partnership ever for India in the shortest format for any wicket. Perhaps, their partnership is now the highest for fourth wicket or lower in the history of T20 Internationals. Overall, it is the ninth highest in the all-time list with seven of them coming for the first wicket.
Also, the much-famed duo also broke the all-time record for the fifth wicket. Nepal's Kushal Malla and Dipendra Airee had added 145 runs against Hong Kong in October last year. This will go down as one of the best comebacks for India as not often does a team manages to win a game after being 22/4 in a T20I. Well, India couldn't win it in the regular 40 overs of game but eventually managed to do it at the end of the second super over.
