Former India head coach Ravi Shastri was a part of the national team for four years, and during that time, team India were among the teams to beat in almost all formats of the game. Shastri presided over some of India's biggest victories, especially away from home.
Under his tutelage, the side travelled to Australia, beating them twice, and replicated their performance against England in a Test Series that the Men in Blue almost secured, if not for a Covid-19 outbreak that postponed the series to this year. However, their victories were not only limited to red-ball cricket. Team India did exceedingly well in the limited-over format as well.
When asked if there were any previous results that the former coach would like to change, Shastri pointed out the heart-breaking defeat against New Zealand in the 2019 World Cup semifinals in England, “As a coach that semifinal game against New Zealand in 2019 got over the same day. Unfortunately, it started raining, we had the momentum,” Shastri said during an interaction on ESPNCricinfo.
India went on to lose that match by 18 runs, which saw the 50-over contest being played in two days. The first day began with India dictating the proceedings as the Men In Blue wrapped up the Kiwi innings for 239/8. But with rain pouring down at the end of the Kiwi's innings, the match was resumed on the reserve day as India failed to complete the 240-run chase and were bundled out on 221.
This was not the only result that the 59-year-old would like to change.
Shastri spoke about another match that would have been iconic if the results had swung the other way round. The incident was from the 1987 World Cup, which was also a semifinal that India had lost against England. “As a player in the '87 World Cup semifinal, I think we had a better team than 83 to go the distance and win the final in Calcutta. So that semifinal loss that hurt,” he said.
