If we start talking about Cricket, then one must forced to think about one of the cricket giants, Australia. They dominated cricket world like no else did, their team in 2000's gives us a glimpse of early West Indies team. They have the maximum, 5 ICC Cricket World Cup. But when it comes to T20 World Cup, they didn't taste any success till now. They played once in a final, 2 semi-final appearances and 3 group stage exit. These number didn't match the brand of cricket played in Australia. But, T20 World Cup 2020 played in their own backyard. Before getting too further, lets go back to T20 World Cup 2016. Why they did't won that year.
Journey of T20 World Cup 2016
Another T20 World Cup and another hope for the cricket giants to win the T20 World Cup. They didn't had a great start of 2016 as Australia was beaten by India in their home by 0-3. But whenever we see mighty Australian playing cricket and entering in big tournaments, you just can take them lightly. One of the main reason for their loss in T20 World Cup 2016 was to alter their opening combination. Regular open David Warner sent at number 4 in order to adjust U Khawaja, who had unforgettable Big Bash season by scoring lots of runs. Lets see how their journey proceeded.
1st match vs New Zealand at Dharmashala
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| Mitch McClenaghan used his Mumbai Indian's experience and showed the way to bowl in death over to hand New Zealand their second win of the tournament. Image Source - Google | Image by - theguardian |
Australia faces New Zealand who had a very successful outing against a strong team, India. New Zealand won the toss and boosted by defending low total against strong batting line-up of India, opted to bat first. Martin Guptill and skipper Kane Williamson(24) gave them a good start by scoring 58 in the powerplay without loosing any wicket, leaded by Martin Guptill who scored 39(27) including 4 huge sixes. Australia strike back into the match by sending both openers in quick succession. New Zealand didn't recover from there and kept loosing wickets in regular interval. Australian bowlers kept hitting right areas and didn't allowed big hitters Munro 23(26), Ross Taylor 11(11) and C Anderson 3(6) to score runs. Grant Elliott scored crucial 27(20) to give their bowlers something to defend. New Zealand set a target of 143 runs to Australia which looked chaseble with kind of batting line-up that Australian team had.
Australia looses Shane Watson early in the chase but the Big Bash hero Khawaja kept on playing his shots and Australia scored 50 runs in first 6 overs with the only wicket of Shane Watson. Chase was set for other batsman and its Australia's game to loose. But as New Zealand are known for their never say die attitude and produces upset in big tournaments, they respond in tough way. Firstly, Mitch Santner got the better of Steve Smith, followed by run out U Khawaja(38). Santner removed Warner for just 6 runs. Australia faced mini collapse but they the target was modest, they just wanted to bat sensibly. They needed 77 runs off 60 balls. Glenn Maxwell 22(23) and Mitch Marsh 24(23) didn't took any risk in view to score fast at the end. Equation brought down to 43 off 30 balls. Its all Australia game to loose now. But Maxwell departs on the first ball of 16th over and from there on New Zealand bowlers didn't allowed them to score much boundaries. As a result of this, Australia falls apart by 8 runs. Mitch McClenaghan was awarded Man of the Match (3-0-17-3) for his ruthless death bowling. Australia once again didn't had a good outing in the World T20.
2nd match vs Bangladesh at Bangalore
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| Australian spinner and the Man of the Match, Adam Zampa took 4-0-23-3. Image Source - Google | Image by - cricketcountry |
Australia faced Bangladesh in their next match. Australia won the toss and elected to field. Bangladesh didn't started off well and lost S Sarkar and Sabbir Rahman inside powerplay. Bangladesh scored 33/2 in their first 6 overs. Md Mithun(23) and Shakib Al Hasan(33) gave some contribution to steady Bangladesh's inning. But Bangladesh kept loosing wicket at regular interval and the scorecard says 105/5 in 15.2 overs. But all time reliable Mahmudullah quickfire runs in the last 5 overs gave Bangladesh something to defend. Mahmudullah score 49*(29). Bangladesh ended up scoring 156/5 in their 20 overs. Once again Khawaja provided Australia a good start. Along with Shane Watson, Khawaja scored 51 runs in powerplay without loosing any wicket. Australian batting line looked nervous and wickets were tumbling one after other. Steve Smith(14) and David Warner(17) got out cheaply. U Khawaja held one end and scored important 58 runs before getting out. Glenn Maxwell's short stay at the crease proved vital. He attacked Bangladesh's bowler and scored 26 runs off 15 balls. Australia somehow won the match by 3 wicket but their perfromance in the first 2 matches showed they surely needed to gear up for the next two big matches vs Pakistan and India as they needed to win both these matches to qualify for the semi's. Adam Zampa was adjusted Man of the Match for his spell of 4-0-23-3.
3rd match vs Pakistan at Mohali
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| All rounder James Faulkner took a 5-fer vs Pakistan at Mohali. He ended with his career best figure of 4-0-27-5. Image Source - Google | Image by - Sakshi Gupta |
2 matches and 2 below par performances by this Australian Team. One more bad performance and they were out of the tournament. Another aisan team, not as weak as Bangladesh, was in front of them and Australia on verge of knocking out of T20 WC 2016. Important toss to win for Australia and they decided to set the target this time as were not good enough while chasing in the previous match.
Australia while trying to score quickly, lost 3 early wickets. In form Khawaja(21), Aaron Finch(15) and out of form David Warner(9) got out cheaply. The one thing that Australia had was good run rate. They were 57/3 when Finch got out in 7.2 overs. Its now upto Reliable Smith and attacking Maxwell. They didn't disappointed. Skipper Smith score unbeaten 61*. Glenn Maxwell scored 30 runs off just 18 balls to let his skipper set for the big inning. Maxwell got out and Shane Watson,who devoted into the lower middle order, came. This move proved vital, he scored quick runs at the end. Steve Smith played unorthodox shot against pacer Wahab Riaz was eye catching. Smith and Waston 44*(21) took Australian total to 193/4 and gave Pakistan a mountain to climb. Pakistan's chase was not good enough as opener Ahmed Shehzad(1) fall cheaply. Sharjeel Khan(30), Khalid Latif(46) and Umar Akmal(32) got the start but none of them converted into a match winning knock. Skipper Shahid Afridi scored only 14 runs off 7 balls. Veteran Shoaib Malik somehow kept Pakistan team in the chase with 40*(20) but James Faulkner magic on the other end proved too hard to handle for other batsman. As a result, Australia survived another day in the T20 World Cup 2016 and won the match by 21 runs. James Faulkner was awarded for his 5 wicket hall. He ended up with the figure 4-0-27-5.
4th match vs India at Mohali
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| Australia suffered Virat Kohli's masterclass and had early exit in the ICC T20 World Cup. Image Source - Google | Image by - WRIDDHAAYAN BHATTACHARYYA |
Its India vs Australia, simple equation : Win the match and go to semi final. Australia won the toss in this virtual quarterfinal and elected to bat first. They got off to a superb start. U Khawaja (26 runs off 16 balls) and Aaron Finch(43 runs off 34 balls) gave Indian bowlers a tough time in the powerplay. They added 54 runs in just 4.2 overs before Khawaja sent back by Veteran bowler Ashish Nehra. Australia got the momentum to set big target in the must win contest. But Indian bowlers strike back into the match and got wicket in regular interval. David Warner, who had forgettable World Cup scored only 2 runs. Skipper Steve Smith(6) and Aaron Finch followed David Warner to left Australia struggling at 100/4 in 13 overs. This was quite a good come back by India. Australia never get going from then. Glenn Maxwell(31), Shane Watson(18), James Faulkner(10) struggled to score runs. Wicket Keeper P Nevill scored 10 runs off last 2 deliveries to end Australian inning to 160/6. This target was very much chaseble by Indian strong batting lineup.
The five time ICC CWC champions didn't gave up easily. They made Indian top order struggled with some high variety bowling. Indian was struggling on 49/3 inside 8 overs. Openers Rohit Sharma(12), Shikhar Dhawan(13) and Suresh Raina(10). Dependable Virat Kohli and Yuvraj Singh somehow managed to kept their wickets but runs was not coming. In he process of score runs, Yuvraj departed. He made 21 run off 18 balls. Virat Kohli was joined by his skipper MS Dhoni. They played sensibly for few overs. Equation was brought down to 39 runs required off 18 balls. Little bit of tension in the Indian camp. Well set Virat Kohli took the charge and scored 20 runs off James Faulkner in the 18th over. That proved the turning point of the match. Virat Kohli didn't stop there, he smashed 4 boundaries off Nathan Coulter Nile to left 4 runs off 6 balls. He alone won the match for his team. Dhoni completed the formality by hitting a 4 on the first ball of last over to hand India a 6-wicket victory and ended Australia's campaign of this World Cup. Man of the Match, Virat Kohli scored 82* off 51 balls. Another T20 World Cup and another Australia early exist.
Expectations in T20 World Cup 2020
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| Image Source - Google | Image by - cricket.com.au |
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