Indians lost the toss, but failed to come up with a champion material performance on the day of the Semi finals. Mohammad Shami and Umesh Yadav started off well, especially the latter claiming the price wicket of David Warner. In walked Steve Smith, who played exceptional cricket on the day to come up with a knock, which set the tone for Aussies to dominate. His individual 100 and 100 run partnership with Aaron Finch did hurt the Indian badly. Credits to our bowlers, we pulled it back nicely from the 2nd Batting power play onwards with regular wickets. At one stage, Aussies were threatening to post closer to 375 runs on the board.
Ashwin and Jadeja were the pick of the bowlers in the 1st innings. Ashwin dismissed Maxwell in his 9th over and reduced the impact of onslaught. He set up Maxwell to play slog sweep into the hands of Rahane and the bait ball was his previous delivery, when he bowled a flighted off spinner and deceived him off the length. It was a treat to watch Ashwin containing the Aussies during the middle overs. Michael Clarke has never hit form in this whole tournament, thereby it was for Shane Watson, Haddin and Faulkner to finish things on a high for Aussies. Surprisingly, Mitchell Johnson came up with a blitzkrieg and Indian bowlers' death over weakness was utilized. Mohit Sharma alone used his slower ones effectively, but Yorkers were missing and as our captain rightly pointed out, bowlers in the end overs could have done much better. Still, 330 runs was just above par and on a good day, Indians could have achieved it.
The method to achieve the impossible target was Partnerships and to allow Dhoni to walk in to the crease, when we require another 100 runs. The Openers had their due luck, when Rohit Sharma edged a slip catch to Shane Watson at 1st slip, which bounced just as it was about to be grabbed and Brad Haddin dived to his left to spill one off Dhawan's bat. No Doubt, Aussies were under pressure, as they felt that they posted 40 runs short of their planned target and added to that couple of dropped chances made all their face go red. Shikhar Dhawan utilized this and exploded whereas Rohit was calm at the other end and openers raced to 76 at the end of 13 overs. Dhawan threw his wicket, when he tried to play a lofted extra cover drive and Maxwell took an easy catch in the deep.
Kohli faced a maiden over from Jason Hazelwood and made up his mind to attack Mitchell Johnson, who bowled a smart bouncer wherein Kohli could not control his pull shot and Haddin took an easy catch behind the stumps. Rohit Sharma and Suresh Raina got out in a similar manner, as the ball prior to their wicket rocketed to the boundary lines. Of course, Rohit Sharma's dismissal was a beauty from Johnson which clipped the bails, but Raina tried to be too cute to take a single, a nice diving catch from Brad Haddin ended his short stint at the crease. We were 108 for 4 at this time and still were deprived of the partnerships, the key element to chase big scores.
Dhoni and Rahane stitched 70 run partnership, but the pace at which it came up did not help the cause. Australians bowled brilliantly during this phase and their fielding was top notch. Indians attacked James Faulkner and Shane Watson, but allowed Maxwell to slip in quietly his 5 overs for 18 runs. It was clever from Michael Clarke, as Indians were rebuilding at this stage, after the top order collapse. Once Rahane got out, it was for Dhoni to achieve the impossible. His mind was working like a calculator, as the final requirement was 120 from 8 overs and Dhoni scored 2 consecutive sixes, took a single and we had 13 runs from 3 balls in Shane Watson's over. But to repeat that over on top of another over is humanely impossible and Dhoni had lost Jadeja at the other end for a waste of a wicket... Run Out!
When Maxwell ran Dhoni out, shutters were closed for India's chances of defending the World cup. We did go down without a fight and Steve Smith's innings was the difference between Australia's win and loss. He continued from where he left in the Tri-series and booked a place for Aussies against New Zealand at MCG. For Indians, it was a wonderful world cup and Dhoni, with his young team brought out the best from all, even when nobody gave them a sniff of a chance at the start. Bowlers were outstanding through out and our Batsmen just had one bad day in the Semi finals and that would not wipe off the fact that Indians played like champions.
AT MCG, it would be a chance for New Zealand to stop Australians from lifting the trophy again. 2015 world cup is a repeat of 2011 world cup, where the Hosts are the finalist and it does highlight that Home advantage is a key element in any sports.
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