'Subah Jalandhar, shaam nu Dilli': Abhishek Sharma's pep talk before 30-ball century

Abhishek Sharma

Abhishek Sharma lit up a dead rubber with a 30-ball century as India completed a 3-0 series sweep over Afghanistan with a 127-run win in the third and final T20I in Delhi on Thursday.Abhishek tore into the Afghanistan bowling attack, scoring 108 off just 34 balls with 11 sixes.

His innings took India to 221 for 7 after Afghanistan chose to field first.

Afghanistan's batting struggled once again, just as it had in the first two matches, and the visitors were bowled out for 94 in 14.1 overs.After the match, BCCI posted a video of Abhishek giving a passionate pre-match speech during the team huddle.In the video shared by the BCCI, Abhishek can be seen addressing his teammates during the pre-match huddle in Punjabi and urged them to finish the series strongly."I'm going to speak Punjabi," Sharma declared to his assembled teammates. "So boys, today we are going to play like soormas. Soorma means warriors. The way we've been playing this entire series, that's exactly how we need to finish it today."

"Warriors never show mercy to anyone. We aren't letting them off the hook today. It's the last match of the series, look at the crowd, we are going to give them full entertainment.

Alright? Otherwise, let's smash it. Chak de phatte, nap de killi, subah Jalandhar, shaam nu Dilli," he added.Abhishek's hundred was the fastest by an Indian in T20Is, breaking Rohit Sharma's 35-ball record set in 2017.It was also the fastest T20I century by a player from a Test-playing nation against another Test-playing nation, going past New Zealand's Finn Allen, who had reached the milestone in 33 balls against South Africa earlier this year.With India having already wrapped up the series, Abhishek's innings added excitement to the final game and capped off a dominant performance before the team heads to the Asian Games.