'I couldn't control my tears of joy'- Sachin

"I couldn't have asked for anything more than this. Winning the World Cup is the proudest moment of my life. Thanks to my team-mates. Without them, nothing would have happened. I couldn't control my tears of joy."

Sachin Tendulkar, who's played six World Cups, on his best moment

"I took a quite few decisions tonight, if we hadn't won I would have been asked quite a few questions: Why no Ashwin, why Sreesanth, why no Yuvraj, why did I bat ahead?! That pushed me and motivated to do well"

MS Dhoni puts a light spin on his selection decisions ahead of India's title win

"This is unbelievable. The Under-19 World Cup, then the World Twenty20 but this is the most special. For Sachin, for everyone else."

Yuvraj Singh, the Player of the Tournament, sums it up

"Very proud of everyone, especially Mahela who rose up to the occasion and put up a great hundred. When you look at this Indian team anything less than 350 looks less! They deserved this title, the way they played in front of a great crowd."

Kumar Sangakkara, the Sri Lanka captain, is gracious in defeat

"All credit goes to Sachin Tendulkar. We played for him. Beating Australia and Pakistan and now this, its a dream come true." 

Gautam Gambhir, who gave India the upper hand in the final with his 97

"It means the world to me. I have been part of the three World Cups. This is for the nation. Thank you very much, we love you. This cup is for the people. Love you India!"

Harbhajan Singh was among several Indian players who shed a tear following India's victory

"This goes out to all the people of India. This is my first World Cup; I can't ask for more. Tendulkar has carried the burden of nation for 21 years; It was time we carried him. Chak de India!"

Virat Kohli leads the Tendulkar tributes

Sehwag fit from shoulder injury..

Virender Sehwag, India's vice-captain for the World Cup, has said that he is "fully fit" for the tournament that begins on February 19. Sehwag missed India's five-match one-day series following the Tests in South Africa to attend to a shoulder injury, but says his recovery is well on track.

"I was feeling some pain in my shoulder," Sehwag told Indian news channel CNN-IBN. "So [I thought it was] better to quit the South Africa one-dayers. I didn't want to get injured in South Africa tour and miss the World Cup. So I came back and went to Germany to see a couple of doctors. I got a couple of injections and now I'm fine.

"I am going to the National Cricket Academy [in Bangalore] and will spend a couple of days there, to check everything - if I can bowl and throw also but if I can't, then I'll let them know. But yes, at the moment I'm fully fit."

Sehwag is wary of the opening game against Bangladesh, who had derailed India's 2007 World Cup campaign with a shock win. "Because we're playing the opening game against them in Bangladesh, Bangladeshi people are expecting them to beat us again. But this time we have to prepare well … You can say it is a revenge game for us and we won't take the game lightly. We will give our best shot and we will come hard on Bangladesh."

Sehwag was confident of India's chances against the other major teams in Group B - South Africa, England and West Indies. "When we played against England last time, we won 5-0 and against South Africa we did well in South Africa and we have done well; when Sachin Tendulkar got the double hundred [in Gwalior], we won the series. West Indies have good players like Pollard and Gayle, if they click then maybe it's difficult for us but India also have very good players."

Virat feels world cup would be the best gift for Sachin

New Delhi: Talented batsman Virat Kohli feels that it would be the best gift to Sachin Tendulkar if the Indian team can win the cricket World Cup which will start in another two weeks time.

"What he (Sachin) has achieved in his entire career, I don't think anyone else will be able to achieve that. So it will be a great thing if we can win the World Cup not only for our fans but also for Sachin who is a special person," the youngster said.

The U-19 World Cup winning captain feels that the biggest challenge during the cricketing extravaganza will be to keep the external pressures not affect their game.

"Playing World Cup in itself is a huge pressure. There will be people who would expect us to do well. The biggest challenge will therefore be not to get distracted by that and concentrate at the job on hand," the 22-year-old Kohli said.

The player who has four centuries from 45 ODIs and enjoys a fantastic average of around 47 said he just tries to keep things simple.

"I just try to play according to my strength and not do anything special. With experience of having played international cricket for the past two years, I have learnt that if one tries too hard for something special, one might just spoil the ability to do things that come naturally. It's hard not to make mistakes but with time you learn from them and the key to success is not repeating the same mistakes over and over again."

Kohli dismissed the notion that injury management has been a problem with Indian players of late as the likes of Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Praveen Kumar have all been injured in the lead up to the World Cup.

"No player likes to get injured. But when you are playing so much of cricket, the body tends to get tired and thus injuries happen. You may be the fittest guy around but suddenly you can twist an ankle and be out of action for six months."

But Kohli admitted that the injuries happening to key players ahead of the showpiece event is unfortunate. "It is definitely a bad time to get injured. No one gets injured intentionally and this is unfortunate that some of our players have sustained injuries."

Asked about the teams which can do well, Kohli named South Africa, Australia and England as the three sides to watch out for in the competition.

When a scribe asked whether India would like to face Australia or Kenya in the final, the cocky youngster replied, "We would like to play in finals. Any opposition is fine with us."

Talking about the ODI series in South Africa where he was the only other player apart from Yusuf Pathan to score two half-centuries, the player said, "I am lucky that I have been able to pull it off pretty well. The bouncy South African pitches suit my style of play. I like to play a lot upright and the ball came on nicely to the bat. Also when you have the confidence to attack the quicks, it helps."

That he is confident can be gauged from the fact that he felt that he could have pulled off the ODI against South Africa in Port Elizabeth where he was unbeaten on 87 as India lost due to Duckworth-Lewis method.

"I don't know but whenever I played under lights, I felt even more confident. I play well under lights. I was talking to Harbhajan Singh during our partnership I felt I could have pulled it off."

Although his captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni is sceptical about the use of Umpires' Decision Review System (UDRS), Kohli said it hardly makes any difference. "I don't think too much about these things. All I know is that if opposition has three referrals, it's same for us."

INDIAN SQUAD FOR CRICKET WORLD CUP 2011

Squad: 

MS Dhoni (capt & wk)

Sachin Tendulkar

Virender Sehwag

Gautam Gambhir

Yuvraj Singh

Suresh Raina 

Virat Kohli

Yusuf Pathan

Harbhajan Singh

Praveen Kumar

Zaheer Khan

Ashish Nehra

Munaf Patel

                                                       Piyush Chawla

                                                       R Ashwin

India's major concern ahead of the team selection was the injuries to four first-choice players - Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir and quick bowler Praveen Kumar - but the selectors picked all four, confident that they will be fit in time for the tournament which starts on February 19.

India's bowling attack for the World Cup will be significantly different from their standard Test attack, with only Zaheer Khan and Harbhajan Singh being named. The fast bowling pair of Sreesanth and Ishant Sharma, and Ojha are all excluded while Munaf Patel, who helped India to a series-levelling victory over South Africa on Saturday, has found a place as the fourth seamer.