Indian skipper Rohit Sharma admitted they were not good enough after they suffered a heartbreaking loss of six wickets in the World Cup final 2023 against Australia at the Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad on Sunday.
India was skittled out for 240 on a slow pitch as the ball was not coming on to bat. India continued with their strategy of attacking in the Powerplay overs but they also lost three wickets. Rohit Sharma’s catch was taken brilliantly by Travis Head while running back and it turned out to be the big moment in the game as the Indian captain was blazing away.
Shubman Gill and Shreyas Iyer were both dismissed cheaply for four runs each and thus Kohli and KL Rahul, the pair that had bailed India out of trouble in their opening World Cup match against Australia, had to play cautiously.
While Rahul and Kohli did steady the ship but they could not score at a brisk pace in the middle overs. The duo could not find a boundary for 97 balls and the run-rate significantly dropped.
Furthermore, both of them were dismissed after completing their respective fifties and thus the final flourish could not come. Ravindra Jadeja was promoted in the batting order but he could not take his opportunity whereas Suryakumar Yadav also failed to get going.
On the other hand, India had Australia under the pump at 47-3 with Jasprit Bumrah striking twice but Marnus Labuschagne and Travis Head added 192 runs for the fourth wicket, the second highest in the World Cup final. Head scored a scintillating knock of 137 runs as he played aggressively and delivered in the big clash to take Australia to their sixth World Cup title.
Labuschagne played the supporting role with great confidence as he scored a crucial knock of 58 runs in the run-chase.
Rohit Sharma said in the post-match presentation, “The result has not gone our way. We were not good enough today. We tried everything but it wasn’t supposed to be. 20-30 runs more would have been good, KL and Kohli were stitching a good partnership and we were looking at 270-280 but we kept losing wickets. When you have 240 on the board, you want to take wickets but credit to Head and Labuschagne who stitched together a big partnership and put us completely out of the game.”
He added, “We tried everything we could but I feel wicket got slightly better to bat under lights. Don’t want to give that as an excuse. We knew under lights it would be slightly better to bat, but don’t want to give that as an excuse. We didn’t put enough runs on the board. With the seamers upfront, we took those 3 wickets and another wicket there, we could open up the game. Credit to those two guys in the middle for stitching an outstanding partnership.”
India was dominant throughout the tournament as they won all of their 10 matches but unfortunately could not bring their best in the all-important final.
