Jongwe reveals story behind shoe celebration, Sikandar Raza talks Zimbabwe’s win over India

Zimbabwe caused a major upset on Saturday at Harare Sports Club, where they successfully defended a modest target of 116 against a youthful Indian team captained by Shubman Gill.

The Indian batsmen struggled to apply themselves in the run chase, losing half their side by the 10th over, with Dhruv Jurel falling victim to Luke Jongwe on his T20I debut.

Jongwe's distinctive 'shoe call celebration' after taking the wicket stemmed from a playful pre-match conversation with his girlfriend Brenda Jasi, where they brainstormed celebratory ideas.

“I came up with the idea for the celebration while I was on a call with my girlfriend Brenda (Jasi). We were actually discussing a celebration I would do if I get a wicket the next day in my hotel room so I went with the shoe celebration.

"I told her each time I get a wicket I would be calling you and I hope I won’t run out of airtime,” the Zimbabwe cricketer was quoted as saying by The Standard.

Zimbabwe's captain, Sikandar Raza, expressed delight at his team's victory while acknowledging the ongoing challenge posed by a relatively inexperienced Indian lineup.

“Feel really happy about the win. Need to take one game at a time. The job is not done, series is not over. World champions play like world champions so we need to be ready for the next game,” Raza said.

“This isn't a wicket where you get bowled out for 115. Credit to the bowlers of both sides. Clearly an indication we need to up our skills. I said I don't care about the result as long as we could be true to the crowd and changing room, we had our plans, we stuck to it and we backed our guys. Our catching and ground fielding was amazing but we did make some errors, shows there's room for improvement. We knew the fans would lift us up and give us energy, credit to them, it helped us.”