The Indian cricket team wrote history on this day back in 1983 after the Kapil Dev-led side lifted the first-ever World Cup in the history of ODI cricket becoming only the second team to achieve the feat then.
The pundits believe that Kapil’s stunning catch to send Viv Richards packing was the moment from where the match changed. But there was one more incident and an unknown one that triggered Balwinder Sandhu to take on the West Indies batting attack.
Sandhu came in at number 11 for India and scored 11* off 30. But a bouncer from Malcolm Marshall hit him on the flap on his helmet.
While the wicket-keeper Jeffrey Dujon and umpire Dickie Bird checked on Sandhu whether he was ok or not, the Indian showed as if he wasn’t hurt at all.
“The moral victory had to be mine. I did not even rub the area that was hurting, I turned and faced Marshall as if nothing had happened,” says Sandhu according to a report in The Indian Express.
Sandhu gave a 22-run stand with Syed Kirmani for the lats wicket as India managed to score 183 in less than 55 overs.
But that blow had already triggered him and Sandhu scalped an early wicket of Gordon Greenidge. He returned with two wickets in that match with Faoud Bacchusbeing his second victim.
For India, it was Madan Lal and Mohinder Amarnath who picked up three wickets. Balwinder Sandhu bagged two while captain Kapil Dev and Roger Binny picked up a wicket each.
India won their second World Cup title 28 years later in 2011 under the captaincy of MS Dhoni.
