Ishant Sharma, one of India’s most senior cricket players, recently opened up about a difficult period in his career that left him feeling lost and struggling with his mental health. In a recent interview with Cricbuzz, the Delhi star spoke about a disastrous over that became the turning point in a match against Australia in 2013. James Faulkner had smashed Ishant for 30 runs in a single over, comprising four sixes and a boundary, resulting in a devastating loss for India.
Ishant revealed that the incident had a profound impact on him, causing him to feel immense guilt every day for a month after the match. He said that he cried over the phone to his then-girlfriend and now wife, Pratima Singh, who hails from a sporting background, and spoke about how she helped him get through the bad phase.
“The thing that hurt me the most was I was the reason behind the team’s loss. I was dating my wife at that time and I just spoke to her and I think I just cried for almost a month. I used to call her everyday and cry over the phone saying that team lost because of me,” Ishant said while speaking on Cricbuzz’s ‘Rise of New India’ show.
Despite the support of his teammates, including Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Shikhar Dhawan, who encouraged him to recover, the incident had a long-lasting impact on Ishant’s career. He acknowledged that the catastrophic over massively jeopardized his white-ball career, and people started perceiving him as someone who doesn’t fit in the realm of limited-overs cricket.
Ishant, who has 105 test caps to his name, expressed regret that the incident cut short his white-ball career, stating that he could have made a big name for himself in the format. Nevertheless, the tall, lanky pace bowler remains a great servant of Indian cricket, known for his epic over that tormented and ultimately dismissed Ricky Ponting in a Test match back in 2008 when he was just 19 years old.
