Witnessing history
Sometimes in my job I am lucky enough to witness sporting history and yesterday was one of those rare occasions.
When I woke up I wasn't sure I'd see any cricket, let alone a world record. There was torrential rain in St Kitts and there were some doubts about whether the South Africa v the Netherlands game could go ahead.
But the sun came out and thank goodness the match went ahead. To be honest a clash between South Africa and the Dutch didn't quite get the pulses racing - but how wrong I was!
First it looked like South Africa might struggle when they lost AB De Villiers to the second ball of the match. But it was . Gibbs has been involved in historic moments before - "dropping the World Cup" in 1999 , scoring 175 as South Africa chased down 434 to beat Australia in Johannesburg, for example.
History was made in the 30th over of the match. The bowler was Daan Van Bunge, a 24 year old who works as a trainee in a media office and he may be fielding lots of press enquiries after what happened to his bowling.
The first three balls disappeared into the stand where I was sitting - one of them breaking the window of the commentary box next door to me. The fourth ball was a full toss dispatched over the midwicket boundary before Gibbs struck balls five and six over the long on boundary.
I was sitting next to our Australian commentator Jim Maxwell who turned to me after the second six and suggested the feat may be on. As van Bunge delivered the final ball of the over my mind wandered to Malcolm Nash being hit "into Swansea" by Gary Sobers. Ravi Shastri hit six sixes in an indian domestic game in 1985 - but Gibbs became the first man to record the feat in an international match.
It was a fantastic moment to witness - I am just relieved that he didn't aim one of those sixes at the commentary box where I was sitting!
