June 25, 1983, was the day when every Indian rejoiced after witnessing Kapil Dev lifting the Cricket World Cup 1983 in the balcony of Lord’s in London. The sight of the Indian team celebrating after holding the coveted trophy still remains fresh in our memories. However, the road to victory wasn’t easy. Kapil Dev’s men started off as underdogs in the tournament. But as they say, fortune favours the brave, the Indian team put their best foot forward in the tournament. They even went on to beat mighty opponents like Australia, Pakistan, Zimbabwe and England. India was going to face West Indies in the finals. Know All About 1983 Cricket World Cup: History, Participants and Winner of the Third Edition of World Cup. 

On the dawn of June 25, 1983, not everything went India’s way as West Indies won the toss and elected to field first. West Indies were known for their pace batteries and had stalwarts like Andy Roberts, Malcolm Marshall, Michael Holding and Larry Gomes who were consistently at work and made sure that the batsmen do not stay on the crease for a long time. Sunil Gavaskar made his way to the pavilion on three. Kris Srikkanth and Mohinder Amarnath made 38 and 26 runs respectively. None of the other batsmen could even touch the score of 30 runs and by the end, India could only post a total of 183 runs on the board.

Watch the video highlights of the match below:

It looked like the cup had slipped away from the hands of the Indians. But magical spells from Madan Lal made it difficult for the Windies to survive. Balwinder Sandhu was the first one to send Gordon Greenidge packing on the score of one. Desmond Haynes followed. Viv Richards was the only batsman who could reach a total of 33. Lack of support from the other end made it even worse for him and the Indian bowlers continued to attack the opponents. By the end, the Windies team got bundled out on 150 and India walked away with the glory. Needless to say that even today, it gives me goosebumps as I write the line INDIA WON THE WORLD CUP 1983 BY BEATING TWO TIME CHAMPS WEST INDIES. With India not losing a single game so far in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019, it would be interesting to see if Virat Kohli and men can replicate the feat this time as we..

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jun 25, 2019 11:55 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).