Remember, how an under-performing England team conceded “Advantage India”, since Rohit Sharma & Co. were playing all their matches in Dubai? Now, freshly ousted from the Champions Trophy, Team Australia’s skipper Steve Smith has rubbished those claims, after being beaten in semis by 4 wickets.
No Advantage to Team India
After the match, Smith admitted that India outplayed them. “Yeah, look, I’m not buying into it. I think it is what it is. India obviously played some really good cricket here. The surface kind of suits their style with the spinners that they’ve got and the seamers that they have at their disposal for a wicket like that. They played well, they outplayed us, and they deserve the victory, Smith was quoted as saying by ANI.
After opting to bat first, Australia posted 264, and many felt that they were a few runs short. In the end, that exactly proved to be the case. But then, Australia had a slight advantage batting first for sure, “Yeah, I think the toss was the right decision. I think we had our opportunities throughout to post something above 300. We were probably just that one wicket down too many at a few stages throughout the innings. If we extended one of those partnerships a little bit, we’re probably getting up 290 – 300, and we’re putting a bit of pressure on the scoreboard,” he said.
India vs Australia, Champions Trophy 2025
“So, it’s clearly not the easiest wicket to bat on. The square block as a whole I think has seen a lot of cricket over the last couple of months. We can see it’s pretty tired and that’s probably the reason why we haven’t seen a score above 300 in the tournament here so far. So we did a reasonable job but we probably just lacked a couple of those partnerships just dragging out a little bit further to get us up somewhere near 300 or just above,” he added.
Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma Dropped
In fact, the Aussies too had their moments in the field, but then they ended up dropping a few chances of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, that cost them the match. “We dropped a couple of chances and I think when you’re trying to squeeze the game and you’re trying to build a lot of pressure, you need to take those chances when you’ve got 260 on the board. But that’s the game, it happens. No one means to drop a catch. It’s part of the game,” Smith said.
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