Having missed a chance to sweep the five-match cricket series after taking a 4-0 lead, Australian skipper Steve Smith on Saturday said poor fielding was responsible for his side’s six-wicket defeat to India in the fifth ODI here.
The Australian fielders dropped Rohit Sharma (99) and Dhoni (34) at crucial junctures apart from other sloppy fielding misses to let the visitors off the hook. In the end Manish Pandey drove visitors to victory with an unbeaten 104.
“We didn’t score too many runs in the last two overs and then dropped our chances. I think both factors cost us today. But fielding cost us quite a lot tonight. We dropped a couple of regulation chances and when you drop players like that they are going to come back and bite you. Spider cam was our best fielder tonight, saved us four runs,” said Smith after the defeat.
“The plan was to not give anything away to MS Dhoni. The first plan was to get him out, but we failed to take the chance that we got. We were able to put pressure on him when he first came to the crease, get a few dots on him as we were trying to take a wicket. He is a dangerous player and finds a boundary at the right time, and for him to hit a six in last over, that got them home I guess,” he added.