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Great win. A vintage ODI chase. Kohli's Partnerships with Shreyas & Rahul were too good. A text book for youngsters to study how to play risk free cricket as per the situation. Overall a great team effort.

I think Rahul deserves a better treatment from the management. Such a class player must not be coming after Axar (no offense to Axar). He is genuinely good stroke player and we should back him good. Though yesterday's innings was very good, overall he seems to be low in confidence / confused about his role.

I wish Rohit will score a match winning 100 on finals and hopefully choose to retire with pride.

Comparing this game with the 2023 World Cup final

In terms of the batting order, apart from the fact that we had 3 less all-rounders, there was one big change in the batting order.

That is Axar in the middle order to take forward the positivity of Shreyas.

Both Kohli and KL are similar kind of players in terms of them being grafters. On their day they can annihilate oppositions but they will not prefer to bat the way Rohit or Hardik or SKY do. It is important that both of them do not bat together in case the requirement is a high speed chase. While Kohli can manage the change of tempo, KL struggles outside of the powerplays to get a move on.

Adding an Axar patel in a pinch hitter role between these 2 helps ease pressure off Virat and keep the momentum going. It had worked out in the T20 WC and it is working really well now.

The fact that Australia was down on firepower in the bowling department and also dropped a bunch of catches also helped India's cause. But the fact that we bat till #8 probably meant Australia was pushing too hard and ended up losing too many wickets and eventually getting all out.

I do have a question though. How did Alex Carey find it so easy to deal in boundaries while the entire Indian batting line-up struggled? The commentators kept saying that he was *playing the field* and I understand that he was picking out vacant places on the field with only 4 men out. Why couldn't Shreyas and Virat manage to do that to a 2nd string bowling attack?

Inglis alone hit almost as many boundaries in his 61 as Kohli, Shreyas and Axar combined in their total 155 runs.

I wanted to log in today and ask the forum about this, why Axar before Rahul. I too think it's more of a calculated strategy, like this post:

Would be good to get more thoughts on this strategy. I guess Axar at that slot will raise the tempo, without wasting too many balls?

I don't think he is fat. Maybe a tad unfit by international standard. If you see him moving in the field he is still agile but not the same way someone like Virat moves. Obviously he doesn't have the kind of fitness Kohli possess which is the result of hard work and discipline.

He can still play long innings evident by his recent odi century against England in Feb. It's just he has lost the temperament of staying long at the wicket. All the Intent stuff has gone to his head so he looks to Smack sixes even when there isn't any run rate pressure. He clearly can't play 2027 world cup so he should retire after this tournament or selectors need to take the hard call. It's time someone like Jaiswal to be groomed as an ODI opener.

It's clearly something Gambhir wants.
Axar plays spin really well. He has bailed India out in tests so many times against spin.
We don't have a proper lefty batter. So, when need comes Axar is promoted. With KL and Hardik plus Jaddu to come it's a good move. When it works we win matches comfortably like yesterday.

Also for a left right combo, our current coach likes that strategy plus what antz said he keeps the scoreboard ticking in middle order.

Will South Africans be able to throw monkey off their backs and wipe off the "chokers" tag, they have lost

1992 -World Cup semifinal v England,

1999 -World Cup, semifinal v Australia,

2003 -World Cup, group match v Sri Lanka,

2007 -World Cup semifinal v Australia,

2011 -World Cup, quarter-final v New Zealand,

2013 -Champions Trophy semifinal v England,

2015 -Cricket World Cup semifinal v New Zealand,

2023 -Cricket World Cup semifinal v Australia,

2024 -T20 World Cup final v India.

By the way yesterday, I saw the weakest bowling attack from Australia, these blokes will need "sandpaper" to wipe their tears. Last 10 overs they were just gambling. Brain fade seems to be too common for Smith. Dropping catches was so un-Australian type.

All in all loved the old style of orthodox display of boring cricket, minus captain, the kind of cricket he plays & displays, anyone can replace him, even from club level.

I loved the fitness culture brought in during Virat's captaincy, winning big matches was kind of regular affairs and dropping big names like Zaheer/Yuvi/Raina on pretext of fitness set the standards really high up and we started to challenge regularly teams like Australia, which isn't the case anymore. Looks like old habits of 90's era is slowly creeping back in.

EDIT:

Can someone get yo-yo test back in and kick this "lean captain" from the team, so far he only looks the weakest link in the chain.

I hope it isn't another brain fade moment - Smith announces his retirement after the CT debacle.

Mr Fit captain are you listening ?

To me, this boils down to the context and the state of the game. when Carey came in, AUS is trying to push for a score around 300+ , with >8 RPO target. Hence Carey's shot selection catered to this context and also he is a natural at that, even though the shot selection carried a high risk percentage. When Virat and Shreyas was batting the required run rate was around 6 RPO, hence milking singles and tows, keeping dot ball percentage to minimum, and not playing the percentage shots (increasing risk) is a better way to bat for the context and also suits their styles as well. Simply put Virat and Shreyas doesn't need to take the risks that Carey took.

Steve Smith retires from ODIs!

Terrific player, with that unorthodox batting stance he scored so many runs. Wishing him the very best.

Almost at 36 years he also knows there is no chance he will get selected for WC 2027 in Aussie setup, so go out with grace and be remembered for knowing when to step out. He played a good last innings as well.

To top it up ODI is a dying format, look at the attendance yesterday for semi final clash, so players will just want to walk away from this format anyway.

What a classic match! I feel really happy for KLR. The poor guy has been pushed and pulled in the batting order, captained India at one point, dropped the next. Everyone heaped on him post 2023 finals debacle. I hope he plays another good innings in the final to help us win this

Gambhir said yesterday in the press conference that "Rohit will play ODI WC in 2027 as well".
Make what you will of that :)

Also, I don't think yo-yo test was ever a problem for him. He has always passed it.

What will happen to Pant ? With KL fitting in nicely and adding heft to the batting order, things are looking increasingly difficult for Pant to be back in ODI setup. His place in T20 is also in doubt.

Pant is a surety for Test Matches.
For ODIs, I'm sure he will be the backup travelling keeper. KL is 32 and might be t he first choice keeper in ODI WC'27 if he keeps up his form. But two years is a long time.

People contemplating that KL will keep wickets in WC 2027, how will this dynamic play out if we win on Sunday and RoKo retire like they did from T20 last year?

With both of them out,
Jaiswal can take Rohit's spot in the batting order
KL can take Virat's
The spot for the keeper is now open and Pant comfortably slots in with Jurel / Kishan remaining the back-up keeper.

Jadeja also retired with RoKo last year, so if he bows out on Sunday too, his replacement Washington is already in the team.

Just realised that they haven't groomed a new captain all these years. They wanted it to be Gill, but he is too young and too inconsistent outside of 50 overs. 50 overs cannot even fill stadiums even for ICC semis. He can't command a place in 20 overs and doesn't score big in red ball cricket.

Shreyas IMO is the best candidate but he is not even in the probables. Then who will it be? KL? Axar Patel?

Yep, we've gone from a problem of plenty to not managing it well, and now, not having a proper dedicated team or captain.

- Pant was being groomed to be captain, but his unfortunate accident and the resulting long break seems to have messed that up. Having Samson, Rahul, Kishan, Jurel around didn't help.
- Then with Pandya, his fragile body took him out of contention quickly after he was considered.
- As will happen with Bumrah.
- Next, SKY for T20I: Honestly, I don't see this happening long term.

That leaves us with KL Rahul: Rahul goes from being the-future to not-being-considered very abruptly and often. Maybe he'll play more consistently with Rohit, Kohli, and Jadeja possibly hanging their boots.

Gill has only himself to blame, he could be so much more but had way too much inconsistency last couple of years.

Love them, hate them, but this just goes to highlight what absolutely focussed cricketers Dhoni and Kohli have been, to captain and excel in all three format, simultaneously!