Tilak Varma is now etched in the history books after he claimed the winning catch of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2026. Standing at long on, Tilak grabbed a great catch off Abhishek Sharma’s bowling as India hammered New Zealand to win the final by 96 runs. Having played all of India’s games at the World Cup, the star Indian batter has now been felicitated by Telangana Chief Minister Revanth Reddy.
Varma returned to Hyderabad for the first time after being a World Cup champion. He landed in his home state after attending fellow teammate Kuldeep Yadav’s wedding in Mussoorie. Upon landing in Hyderabad, Tilak met CM Reddy, who felicitated him with a grand celebration. Ministers Vakiti Srihari and Mohammad Azharuddin, Rajya Sabha member Vem Narender Reddy, SATG Chairman Shivasena Reddy, CM Principal Secretary Srinivasa Raju and MD Sony Baladevi were also present on the occasion.
There has been no announcement of any cash prize by Telangana CM as of yet.
Tilak Varma’s contribution at T20 World Cup
Tilak Varma didn’t have the kind of World Cup that grabs headlines, but by the end of it, India had quietly solved a problem they had been carrying for a while. He started the cycle as a top-order batter, but finished the tournament doing a bit of everything.
Starting off as a No. 3, Tilak wasn’t superb but always had that command of owning a stage. However, when India needed to move on from three lefties up top, Tilak did the finisher’s job perfectly. During the course of the next four games, he registered scores of 44* off 16 while batting at 6 vs ZIM, 27 off 15 vs WI at 5, 21 off 7 vs ENG at 7 and 8* off 6 at 6 vs NZ in the T20 World Cup 2026 final. His strike rate while batting lower down the order was 227.27, which is simply outstanding.
Cricket
Why is no Indian nominated for ICC's Player of the Month award for February?
