Art of Winning Key Moments

After the Twenty20 World Cup high, Indians were expected to give the Australians a run for their money in the one day format. Having said that, one was little unsure what kind of an impact will the return of seniors will be on the team, on the field as well as in the dressing room. The expectations from the new captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni were high having seen his magical touch with the thinking cap on in the Twenty20 World Cup. But the question remained of how well he will be able to handle the three former captains in the side. Amidst all this a score line of 4-2 in favor of Australia hardly revels you anything, considering that India managed to have Australia on the mat many a times but failed to slice the initiative.

The sixth one day match at Nagpur provides you with more than one occasion where Australia seized the opportunity to bounce back and successfully delivered the knock-out punch. The first of those occasions was when India managed to grab four wickets with 121 on the board in 22 overs. Certainly at this point of time, the initiative was with India before Sreesanth spilled a costly catch from Andrew Symonds on two. This cost India a dear, the muscle man powered his way to his first century against India. This was his fourth score of above 75 in this series.

One of the other occasions in that Aussie innings was when Dhoni handled the ball to Yuvraj Singh, the over cost 15 runs. This happened after an excellent art of spin bowling by Harbajan Singh and Murali Karthik, both managed to apply the pressure by not conceding boundaries.

Neither captain has enjoyed the new rule of mandatory ball change after 34 overs. And this has undoubtedly taken a toll on Indian bowlers. India gave away 102 runs in the last 10 overs, 57 of them coming in the last five. Once again, for the third time in the first half of the match India lost the momentum.

Chasing 300 plus score India was blessed with a century stand from the most successful opening pair of Sourav Ganguly and Sachin Tendulkar. The pair added 140 for the first wicket from 25 overs. There on, once again India lost the plot by sending in Irfan Pathan in place of a regular batsman. And in the end overs, the required run rate kept mounting but Indian batsmen couldn’t find boundaries. In the end, India fell short by 18 runs.

Similarly, India got off to good starts but failed to consolidate in the matches played at Bangalore and Kochi. They had Australia at 90 for 4 from 17 overs and 66 for 3 from 16 overs at Bangalore and Kochi respectively. And both those occasions Aussies easily managed a score above 300, clearly shows inconsistency in Indian bowling.

The first ODI was a wash out, but in the second ODI five of the top six Indian batsmen got of to a good start but none of them managed to score a big one.

The Hyderabad ODI saw Yuvraj play a flamboyant knock, but his ton was overshadowed by Aussie brilliance. After 30 overs they had 140 on the board, but runs came thick and fast in the next 20. Aussies managed to pile on another 150 runs in that period.

Australia’s game plan for the Indian batsmen seemed to be the same throughout the series. The Aussie bowlers attacked the off stump channel of the Indian openers and were highly successful in doing so on most of the occasions. Their opening bowlers combined well to haunt the Indian top order getting early breakthroughs, followed by Brad Hogg with his wily spin bowling never allowed Indian scoreboard to tick.

Adam Gilchrist, in one of his columns for a daily before the start of the final ODI in Mumbai mentioned that this is a closely fought series unlike what the score line reads. He said that the Aussies managed to win the key moments. And he is right; they did manage to tilt the balance in their favor every time the situation was even.

India lost the ODI series, but not many Indian fans looked bothered, as all geared up for the much hyped one-off Twenty20 match. A version in which India was crowned World Champions only a few weeks ago, the onus was on the young Indian team to prove that was just for nothing.

Australia taking on World Champions. Now doesn’t that sound odd? Indeed it was and India proved it’s worth the comment by a convincing victory yesterday.

India outplayed Australia in two areas considered to be India’s nightmare. These are running between the wickets and fielding. Such a display has prompted the Aussie captain Ricky Ponting to say that they are willing to play this young Indian team more often in the future. A comment like this can create unwanted pressure and speculations among the Indian news channels, known for their no sense hype.

Spoon feeding them for a chance of speculation was young Robin Uthappa, addressing the pre-match press conference, he said, the dressing room atmosphere is lot more comfortable. What does that really mean? Well, no one knows, and all we have to do is wait for the high voltage Pakistan series to kick start.

Meanwhile, one should not forget the way Australians exhibited their brand of cricket. They have simply mastered the art of winning the 50-50 moments.