March 26, 2015

Aussies deserved Semi finals win over India

Today, 26th March 2015 is a sad day for Indians as the Cricket team lost semi finals match in ICC World Cup 2015. Play took place in Sydney Cricket Ground, Australia (SCG).

CWC 2015 started on 14th February 2015. 10 teams were participating in the tournament. Dominating teams were Australia, India, South Africa, New Zealand. These were the teams which was capable to take a place in Semi-finals.

On 24th March 2015, South Africa lost to New Zealand in a nail biting match. New Zealand booked their place in the finals. It was a question "Who will be playing against NZ, is it India or Australia".

Today, SCG was dominated by Indian fans who have come to cheer up for Team India. Unfortunately, toss was won by Australia and they chose to bat first. Losing the toss was the major setback for Indian team. It was like loosing the match itself. However they made up their mind to give their best and defend the World Cup.

Prior to World cup, Indians toured Australia. They had shown very poor performance against Aussies and England. There was no hope that India will perform great in this World Cup. but India had bounced back and topped the B-table and qualified for Quarter finals. They played against Bangladesh in Quarter finals and won against them. India became the first team to dismiss all 70 wickets in 7 matches. The hopes were back and every Indian started dreaming of defending the World Cup and lift it once again.

But after losing the toss, there was slight disturbance in Indian skipper's mind after losing the toss. When play started, David Warner played some terrific shots which made Indians to lose hope. Umesh Yadav cam back stongly by taking his wicket and gave hope to the team. After this wicket, Steve Smith and Aaron Finch played sensibly and put up a partnership of 182 runs which made Indians to worry a lot. After hitting a century, Smith got out but Maxwell came in and played some brilliant shots to add some more runs.There were some contributions from other players as well. Finally Australia managed to put a huge total of 328 runs on board losing 7 wickets.

 India gave a decent start and their intention was not to lose early wickets. Early wickets mean trouble for India. They kept this in mind and played pretty decently. They were not in attacking mode in first 10 overs. After this Shikhar Dhawan started to attack the bowlers and runs started to flow in but it did not last long. Dhawan got out and trouble for India started. Virat Kohli came in and was very defensive. He could not tackle the bowling attack and finally gave up scoring only 1 run in 13 deliveries. Slowly the game started t drift from the hands of India. They started to lose wickets regularly. Finally they were all out scoring only 233 runs. Top scorer was the skipper M S Dhoni who scored 65 runs.

Australia won the Semi-finals against India by 95 runs. Player of the Match was Steve Smith who scored a Century and a made a crucial run-out.

Now Australia will play against New Zealand on 29th March 2015 at Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG).

I will be supporting NZ team to lift the World Cup 2015 as they have never won any World Cup so far. But Australians have the advantage as it will be played in their home ground and they look dominating at home.

Let's wait and watch who will win the World cup this time.

One intersting fact:
In 2011, host teams were in finals - India and Srilanka.
In 2015, host teams are in finals - Australia and New Zealand.