Team India has suffered yet another setback leading into the next month's T20 World Cup 2022 as they faced a four-wicket loss at the hands of Australia in the first T20I at the PCA Stadium in Mohali on Tuesday, September 20. Despite defending a total in excess of 200, the Indian bowlers failed to get the job done.
Pace spearhead Jasprit Bumrah was benched for this game and his absence was felt as the Men in Blue were clearly short of a death overs specialist yet again whereas, middle-order sensation Matthew Wade yet again established himself as a potential match-winner.
Matthew Wade changed the complexion of the game
After being put into bat first, India lost the key wickets of skipper Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli inside the Powerplay before vice-captain KL Rahul (55) and Suryakumar Yadav (46) went on to add 68 runs for the third wicket. In the end, Hardik Pandya's explosive unbeaten knock of a 30-ball 71 propelled India to 208/6.
Nathan Ellis (3/30) and Josh Hazlewood (2/39) were the picks of the bowlers for the visitors while Cameron Green chipped in with a wicket.
In reply, captain Aaron Finch and Cameron Green ensured a steady start for Australia. It was Green who anchored the chase, scoring a quickfire 61 runs off 30 balls. Once he was dismissed, Matthew Wade played the finisher's role to perfection as he remained unbeaten on a 21-ball 45.
Wade clobbered Harshal Patel for two sixes in the 18th over and Bhuvneshwar Kumar for three fours in the penultimate over to completely change the complexion of the game.
Winning skipper, Aaron Finch said:
"It was a good contest, wasn't it? We had some really good partnerships, there were some good contests between the bat and ball. They came hard at us. You expect the run rate to slow down if you lose wickets. The batters tried to change the momentum of the game. That's what we play for, we still try to instil all the processes leading into the World Cup."
Losing skipper, Rohit Sharma said:
"I don't think we bowled well. 200 is a good score to defend, and we didn't take our chances in the field. It was a great effort from our batters, but bowlers were not quite there. There are things we need to look at, but it was a great game for us to understand what went wrong. We know this is a high-scoring ground. You can't relax even if you get 200. We took wickets to an extent, but they played really well. They played some extra-ordinary shots. If I was in that changing room, I would expect to chase that total. You can back yourself to defend 60 runs in the final four overs. We were not able to take that extra wicket. That was the turning point, if we would have taken another wicket, things would have been different. You can't score 200 everyday, you need to bat well. Hardik batted really well to get us there. We need to look at our bowling before the next game."
Player of the Match, Cameron Green said:
"I was thrown into the deep end (opening for the first time) but having someone like Finchy as an experienced campaigner, he kept me calm. We had the luxury of seeing the Indians bat and Hardik must be one of the best in what he does, it was pleasure to watch him. It was kind of good to watch them bat, and that gave us an idea about how to go about while chasing. (Whether he'll continue to bat as an opener) I have no idea, I'll leave it up to the coaches to think about that."
from Cricket News: Latest and Breaking Cricket News & Updates Today | CricTracker.com https://ift.tt/BYFD2Kn