India have been one of the major powerhouses of World Cricket and when it comes to playing at the grandest stage like World Cup, the team has always been a solid performer and delivered at the grandest stage. There have been some magical wins and on the same hand, there have been some humiliating losses also.
India have won the World Cup on two occasions one in the year 1983 under the captaincy of Kapil Dev and the other one in the year 2011 under the captaincy of MS Dhoni. But there have also been instances when the Indian side have faced defeat at the hands of some of the minnows. Let’s look at the three biggest upsets India have faced in ODI World Cups;
2007 vs Bangladesh
One of the most horrific defeat for the Indian team as well as their fans were in the year 2007, when the Indian side lost a World Cup match. The fans as well as everyone were surprised by this loss as the papers Indian team were a far superior side with some of the big names in the International cricket were playing in the India team.
The only thing that the Indian team won that match was the toss and batted first. After a horrible start Indian team never developed a good partnership and the whole Indian team were bundled out for just 191 runs in their allocated 50 overs. Bangladesh did chase down the target with some initial hiccups and chased down the target with nine balls to spare.
1999 vs Zimbabwe
Another upset came in the 1999 edition of the World Cup when the Indian team lost to Zimbabwe after being in a comfortable situation of winning the World Cup. After restricting the Zimbabwe team to an average total of 252 in the allocated 50 overs, the Indian team as well as fans were quite certain that India will win the match.
However, the Zimbabwe team had other ideas as the duo of Henry Olonga and Heath Streak kept on striking at important junctures of games, and the Indian side who were once cruising along nicely lost the match by mere three runs.
2019 vs New Zealand
Arguably, one match on the list of upsets is certainly the New Zealand loss that the India team sustained in the Semi Final of the 2019 World Cup. The Indian team entered the tournament as one of the favorites and in fact, the Indian team were also in the top spot in the league stage and entered the semi-final as one of the favorites.
But in the semi-final match which was affected by the rain and the after the New Zealand batting the game was taken to the reserve day where the Indian team could not chase down the total of 240 and fell short of 18 runs.