India Makes it Six Out of Six

Today, something historic happened on the world stage. India defeated Pakistan at the Adelaide Oval in the World Cup 2015. India has always been the better team while playing Pakistan, especially in the world cup. As a result, it has never lost to Pakistan in World Cups. This match was no different. It is interesting to analyze what worked in favor of India today.

Great cricket is all about a team performing well in all departments. At the end of the day, India proved to be a better team in all prospects: batting, bowling, fielding and Captaincy. Here is why I think so.

Batting 
Traditionally India’s strength has always been its batting. Today was no different.  Shikhar Dhawan, who had been struggling since a while, fired in this match. Virat Kohli, who had been given the responsibility of carrying the team through, executed his role perfectly with a swashbuckling century. Suresh Raina also provided the shots while Kohli was anchoring the innings. While scoring the runs, they maintained their wicket. This resulted in the formation of two important 100- run partnerships. The team also played risk- free without getting tempted to fire big shots during the mid-overs, while consistently maintaining the run rate. Pakistan, on the other hand, could not build a solid partnership barring a 68 – run stand between Ahmed Shahzad and Haris Sohail. Even the potentially dangerous Shahid Afridi got out for a measly 22. Misbah, as always, was the lone ranger, with a solid 76. Pakistan kept losing wickets at regular intervals which cost Pakistan the game.

Bowling
Indian bowlers have constantly been criticized for their performance recently. Bowling is often cited as India’s weakness. More so, on the Aussie conditions. However, in this match the bowling became one of India’s strength. Instead of restricting runs, they decided to go for the wickets and it paid off. The bowlers kept taking wickets at regular intervals, which eventually whisked the match out of Pakistan’s hands. Pakistan bowlers on the other hand could hardly maintain that pressure on the batsmen. They did well in the end, though, picking up wickets. If those wickets had been taken earlier, the result might have been different. The only silver lining was Sohail Khan. He captured five Indian scalps on World cup debut.

Fielding
India already is a very good fielding unit. They did well in this match as well. They created chances out of nowhere, even getting some of them. As a result, Pakistan was under pressure. Meanwhile, in Pakistan’s innings, the fielding was fairly good, but Umar Akmal, who was keeping wickets even when he wasn’t a specialist, missed a chance of Virat Kohli which cost them the match.

Captaincy
Dhoni’s captaincy proved to be superior again. Apart from winning the toss, two of his decisions paid off well. First was to review the Umpire’s decision on Umar Akmal. And second was to send Raina earlier in the order.

A champion team is one which does well in all areas: batting, bowling, fielding and captaincy. India played like a champion today and won. The tradition of crushing Pakistan on the World Cup pitch remains intact.