Indian cricket fans celebrate victory in the World Cup final. Photo: AFP
MUMBAI:
Millions of euphoric Indians celebrated on Monday what cricket great Virat Kohli hailed as a “phenomenal” display in winning the T20 World Cup for a record third time.
The co hosts and pre tournament favourites swept aside New Zealand by 96 runs in Sunday’s final in front of 86,000 spectators at Ahmedabad’s Narendra Modi Stadium.
India became the first team to lift the trophy on home soil, the first to retain it and are now the most successful side in the history of the global showpiece.
Indian newspapers praised Suryakumar Yadav’s men for their dominant performance, with the mass-circulation Times of India saying they had rewritten history in “bold strokes”.
“India didn’t so much win the title as stroll to it. It was a coronation rather than a final,” it said in a front-page report headlined, “Threemendous: T20 kings keep the crown.”
The English-language Indian Express said it was the first time India had won a showpiece event without a “larger-than-life megastar”.
It credited coach Gautam Gambhir with “sowing the seeds” of belief in the team, calling him the “architect” of India’s triumph.
Cricket is a national obsession in the world’s most populous country, woven deeply into its cultural and social fabric.
Star players enjoy adulation and the game serves as a rare unifying force in an otherwise diverse nation.
Celebrations across country
As the victory became inevitable late Sunday, thousands of delirious fans converged on Delhi’s India Gate monument waving tricolour flags, beating drums and dancing to blaring Bollywood hits.
Drivers came out of their cars on the broad avenues around the monument to join impromptu street celebrations that stretched long into the next day.
The scene was replicated in cities, towns and villages across the country.
Batting great Sachin Tendulkar hailed the Indian team as “totally deserving and rightful winners”.
“What a fantastic performance by our team and a special brand of cricket on display,” he said, referring to their fearless attacking game.
The 50-year-old shared a photo of fans gathered outside his Mumbai residence long after midnight, writing: “Not in Mumbai to witness the celebration… but it’s happening all over the country.”
Thousands of fans also celebrated outside the Ahmedabad stadium, where India suffered heartbreak in the 2023 50 over World Cup final.
“India has now won back-to-back. So we hope in the next World Cup we will win as well,” Akshay, a 35-year-old engineer, told AFP.
Daval Shah, another fan, said he throughly enjoyed the game even though it was pretty one-sided.
“It’s always been in one corner of our mind that we were defeated here,” said Shah, 40, referring to the 2023 loss to Australia.
“It’s like a jinx, but we have broken the jinx today.”
Indian batting superstar Kohli, who retired from the shortest format of the game after India’s 2024 title win, called the performance “phenomenal”.
“Absolutely no match for the explosive cricket played by us throughout the tournament,” he wrote on X.
