Team India’s fairy-tale World Cup campaign ended in one stroke at the Sydney Cricket Ground with the mighty Australians stamping a 95-run defeat on MS Dhoni and his band in the tournament’s second semi-final on Thursday.
Failed by his batsmen, let down by his fielders (Kohli dropped a sitter which gave 27 extra runs to the Aussies and then he returned cheaply scoring only one run) and not supported well by his bowlers who conceded a mountainous 328 runs in the crunch game, it was heartbreaking to see a visibly downcast and broken skipper fighting a lone battle of survival and returning with the highest individual score of 65.
After giving up to an accurate throw by Glenn Maxwell from mid-wicket which hit the stumps directly, Dhoni scampered into the dressing room at extra speed, perhaps, to end his agony in privacy. Within two to three minutes of his departure, the stadium emptied out with distressed Indian fans leaving with tears and only a handful of Australian supporters staying back for the celebrations.
After seven direct wins in the tournament and 70 wickets in the bag, it was not the way to go for India. The surrender was reminiscent of the one at Johannesburg in the 2003 final when Australia had posted 359 and India could get to only 234 with Virender Sehwag top scoring at 82 and Sachin Tendulkar, much like Kohli, walking for just four.
But since then, the runs in the game and India’s reputation of chasing them down with Dhoni at the helm had grown to such an extent that Thursday’s plummet (Kohli 1, Raina 7, Jadeja 16) looked uncalled for. Though Dhoni put up a brave face in the presence of the media, trying to laugh around and play down his obvious disappointment with how the day had panned out, the surrender was painfully familiar and came with the added burden on the heart because it was cheap.
Dhoni, as he does with all else, broke up the reasons into three simple categories: losing the toss, conceding too many runs and an inadequate opening partnership. All said, India’s run in the tournament till the semi-final could not be faulted and the long-faced, pensive dressing room that was the focus of all cameras at Sydney Cricket Ground, depicted how desperately the boys had wanted a win this Thursday. That self-belief is what Dhoni says, is a positive he would like to take home even if failed to take the Cup.
“It’s something that doesn’t belong to anyone. We took it (Cup) from someone, so somebody took it from us…. If we had played better cricket on this day, we would have gone into the finals. In any international sport you have to be at your best. If not, the Cup gets shared,” he said as a matter of fact.
He would not answer queries on all the crying in the dressing room and what he said to the team in consolation, but he was clear about the fact that he would not be quitting anytime soon as “I am 33, I am fit” and would take a call only after the 2016 T20 Word Cup.
The Australians, meanwhile, showed off that they know how to win big matches and their outstanding performance both with the bat (Smith 103, Finch 81 after losing a quick wicket of David Warner at 12) and the ball, not to mention the fielding (2 direct throw run outs), made them the most deserving candidates for a ticket to the Melbourne Final on March 29.