VIDEO | Sunil Gavaskar’s “curse” results in Suresh Raina’s wicket

After losing stand-in captain Rohit Sharma early and Shikhar Dhawan failing to connect with the ball cleanly, the onus was on Suresh Raina to guide India through the treacherous waters of the Cape Town wicket. And the veteran Indian did just that as he raced away to 43 off just 26 balls. It looked like he was in complete control and nothing could go wrong, but it was then that Sunil Gavaskar decided “to have his say”.

Gavaskar, who had been called out for giving out wrong Virat Kohli stats during commentary and later criticized for making a distasteful joke about Jaydev Unadkat’s selection, went into the Indian fans’ bad books again. 

The veteran commentator before the fourth delivery of the 10th over, with India at 79/1, was speaking about the T20 mentality, when he was heard saying, “If I hit, great. If I don’t, if I mistime (the ball) so be it. There are still 8 wickets to come after this wicket is gone.”

As luck would have it, Shamsi’s flighted delivery was there for the hitting and the Indian southpaw decided to go for it and mistimed his shot. Farhaan Behardien, standing at long on, took a smart catch to send Raina packing.

This, however, isn’t the first time that South Africa have benefitted from the “commentator’s curse”. Last year while playing against Australia, David Warner lost his wicket just after commentator Mark Nicholas brought out the stat that Warner has never been out on the 90s. As things turned out, Warner was dismissed on the very next ball for 97.