In the absence of Jasprit Bumrah and Arshdeep Singh, Indian fast-bowling lineup looked lacklustre against a rampant batting lineup at Punjab Cricket Association IS Bindra Stadium, Mohali. In the last four overs, Australia needed 55 runs but Indian pacers Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Harshal Patel could not contain Matthew Wade as his big-hitting helped his side chase down 209. After another loss while defending, Rohit Sharma pin-pointed that phase which turned out to be the turning point of the game.
“You can back yourself to defend 60 runs in the final 4 overs. We were not able to take that extra wicket. That was the turning point, if we would have taken another wicket, things would have been different. You can't score 200 everyday, you need to bat well. Hardik batted really well to get us there. We need to look at our bowling before the next game,” Rohit said in the post-match presentation.
Harshal Patel dropped a half chance off his own bowling and was hit for 22 runs in the 17th over including three sixes. Bhuvneshwar struggled in the penultimate over once again and conceded 16 runs including three boundaries. This was the first time Bhuvneshwar conceded more than 50 runs in a T20I game. In the final over, Yuzvendra Chahal had just two runs to defend as pacers hugely disappointed.
“I don't think we bowled well. 200 is a good score to defend, and we didn't take our chances in the field. It was a great effort from our batters, but bowlers were not quite there,” Rohit said.
Despite the loss, Rohit took some positives from the game as well. Also, he credited the Australian batters (Cameron Green, Steve Smith, Wade) for their sensational hitting.
“There are things we need to look at, but it was a great game for us to understand what went wrong. We know this is a high-scoring ground. You can't relax even if you get 200. We took wickets to an extent, but they played really well. They played some extra-ordinary shots. If I was in that changing room, I would expect to chase that total,” he added.
