Rahul Tewatia sixes: WATCH Sheldon Cottrell goes for five sixes in an over

Sports teaches you a very important life lesson- “Never ever give up”. Your friends, foes, and even the whole world may tell you that you are incapable of doing something, but if you believe in yourself and back your abilities, nothing else can stop you. One such incident that motivates all of us to believe in ourselves happened in the recently concluded IPL match between Rajasthan Royals and Kings XI Punjab. After failing miserably with the bat in the first 23 balls that he faced, RR’s Rahul Tewatia backed himself and hit five sixes in an over and thereby took Rajasthan to a miraculous win against Kings XI Punjab. His fairly-tale innings is one for the ages.

Part 1: Rahul Tewatia the villain

The story of Rahul Tewatia’s fairytale innings starts right in the 10^th over of the match. Chasing a humungous total of 224, RR got off to a great start courtesy of Sanju Samson and Steve Smith. They took advantage of the short boundaries of Sharjah and plundered each and every bowler out of the park. The 81 run partnership was broken when Steve Smith was caught in the deep cover in the last ball of the 9^th over and to everyone’s surprise, the man who came in to bat after him was Rahul Tewatia. He is a strong man known for his power game. RR sent him as a pinch hitter to carry on with the ongoing momentum. But to their disappointment, Tewatia looked really rusty with the bat. He struggled to find bat on ball and ended up wasting almost 3 overs of this high scoring run chase. This earned him a lot of hate on social media. Billions of fans watching the game and even the commentators and well-known names in the cricketing circle stared trolling him, with some of them even asking him to throw his wicket out on purpose.

Feel for Tewatia. But he is losing his team the game

— Harsha Bhogle (@bhogleharsha) September 27, 2020

‘Retiring Out’ should be de-stigmatised. Nothing against the batsman who’s struggling….but if his best efforts to hit aren’t working out, you get the next one in. ‘Sunk Cost fallacy’ #RRvKXIP #RR

— Aakash Chopra (@cricketaakash) September 27, 2020

Need to retire out Tewatia now that you have messed up. #RR

— Saurabh Malhotra (@MalhotraSaurabh) September 27, 2020

As time went, even his batting partner Sanju Samson lost faith in him, it was evident from the single that he refused in the 16^th over. In his own words, it was the worst 20 balls that he had faced in his entire career.

The whole world stopped believing in him, everyone thought that he cost RR their match. But one man still had belief in him. And it was none other than he himself.

Part 2: Rahul Tewatia- The Hero

What followed next was a stunning display of brutal hitting, redemption from a man who has now created a fairytale story to be told for ages. Needing 51 of 18 balls KXIP skipper gave the ball to his most trusted seamer Sheldon Cottrell. And guess what? Tewatia took him on and shut down all the external noises with a fitting reply. He smashed 5 sixes in that over of Cottrell and in the matter of few seconds, he shifted the momentum in favour of the men in pink.

Mr @rahultewatia02 na bhai na ? thanks for missing one ball ! What a game congratulations to rr for a spectacular win !!! #RRvKXIP @mayankcricket great knock @IamSanjuSamson brilliant !

— Yuvraj Singh (@YUVSTRONG12) September 27, 2020

He ended his innings on 53 not out of 31 balls and guided his team to victory along with Jofra Archer who provided him timely support by smashing 13 runs of 3 balls. This innings of his is a story of two halves, one of struggle and the other of sheer belief in one’s own ability.

Through this, he and the game of cricket, in general, have once again taught us an important life lesson- “No matter what happens in your life, believe in yourself”.