The Wait Continues........

 

The Dream have broken once again

 

130 Crore people have got heartbreaks once again. All the prayers and cheers have failed today as Indian team have been thrashed by England in the 2^nd Semi-final by 10 wickets in Adelaide. Just a few hours ago we were dreaming about India vs Pakistan at the iconic MCG, in front of 1 Lakh audience but now the dream has over. We cannot see what players are doing and feeling right now, but the fans all over the world must be feeling broken at the moment.

We could feel the pain of those fans who were at Australia, watching live to their team and heroes. They were already preparing for 13^th November, as they thought it will be easy for us to beat England and we will reach finals easily and win it but our over expectations hurt back us badly. We can say, we choked once again in big moment. But that’s been our story since 2014. It is 8^th consecutive ICC Tournament where we failed and the quest for the trophy continues.

Since last one year, we prepared extremely well for this event after that humiliation in 2021 T20 WC. We played huge no. of games and did reasonably well. Although we couldn’t win Asia Cup, still our preparation had been outstanding and the way our campaign went till today was very good, but that nervous moment in knockouts hunted us another time. All the preparation was for this particular moment but today we failed as a team. And we can only blame to ourselves.

We had last won T20 WC way back in 2007 when there were no franchise leagues, no IPL. But today when we have the biggest cricketing league since 2008 we are unable to lift the trophy once again. It’s been 9 years now when we last time won any ICC Tournament and with this loss we have to now wait for another one year. For someone like Rohit, Virat and other players who were part of that glory moment in 2013 ICC Champions Trophy as young players, not getting able to win any trophies after playing for so much years, really hurting them and to all the fans of Indian Cricket Team.

Performance at a Glance:-

If we review our WC, then we will find we are at that situation where we were at last year after early WC exit. The biggest problem with our campaign this time was our opening pair. Both our openers Rohit (C) & Rahul (VC) completely failed in this tournament. Yes individually Rohit scored 1 innings while KL Rahul 2 innings, but that were against relatively weaker opponent. However they constantly failed to provide good start in power plays. Out of 6 games not even a single times they managed to put a half-century partnership. Last time it was the same story. The only difference was that time it was just in case of 1^st two games, which eventually ended our campaign.

Our success to reaching knockouts this time was only possible due to our middle order where Virat and Surya performed almost in every game. They both got MOM awards twice each in 4 games we won in league stage. The one game we lost here against South Africa, Surya played an unbelievable knock also there. And Hardik was also handy in two crucial games against Pakistan in 1^st game and today in most important Semi-final. In the other hand we couldn’t decide yet, to whom give the wicket keeping duties. DK played initially, while Rishabh played in last two games but both failed to add some impact.

In the bowling front we were excellent till today’s game. Even in that losing cause against South Africa we had put up a very good fight defending 133. But today in a high pressure game our bowlers failed to take even a single wicket of England. Our bowlers literally thrashed by both their openers Buttler and Hales. It reminded us that last year’s game against Pakistan at Dubai. There were no swing and seam moment at this particular venue in Adelaide, which have been strength of our pace bowlers in this WC. But today with lack of it our pacers struggled throughout.

We have almost lost the game against Bangladesh at this venue few days ago, but somehow rain and very poor cricket from Bangladesh gave us a much needed win. But if we talk about our spinners, the main aspects in middle overs for taking wickets, we were completely failed there. Here our best bowler of this format Yuzi Chahal, not given even a single game. Last year he was not picked in the squad, while this time around he was totally benched. The two finger spinners we picked in 11, Axar and Ashwin with little batting depth were looked ordinary with the ball.

This loss has given a huge setback for Indian team and their fans. It will be very tough to digest this humiliation. And we may finally see some over whelming changes in the team after this. Some player’s carrier will be now in small thread. And we may see some new faces coming to the side particularly in this format. As a fan it is very hard to get past from it but this is part of the game and we are quite familiar to it. Players will come and go, WCs will come and go, but the love and passion for the sports and country will remain forever. We will again come together and support to our team whenever and wherever they will play and will wait for next ICC Tournament for fulfillment of our dream.

At the end team is ours, we will be with them always whether win or loss.