Where did the Men in Blue go wrong in 10-wicket loss in semi-finals
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00:00Hello, everyone. Welcome to Straight Bad with Gulf News. We are at the fag end of the World
00:11Cup, in fact, the last semifinal. And India is not going to be there in the final. England
00:17will play Pakistan in the final. That is what today's match has shown us. India lost by
00:2310 wickets and England won with 4-0 to spare. That is quite a rout, actually, to learn all
00:30about that. Let's head over to Satish, the sports editor of Gulf News. Satish, what did
00:34you make of today's match?
00:35Oh, Achan, this is when Butler and Hales get going. You can't stop them, especially Butler.
00:42He fired the first salvo. Butler is a world-class player and the lack of movement and the lack
00:48of pace among the Indian bowlers played into his hands. And after that, he took that gleefully
00:55and went straight away to the top gear in the powerplay overs. And after that, it was
01:00just catching up for Team India and they couldn't do anything against the brilliant counter-assault
01:06attack again by, I would say, more than Butler, it was Hales who literally showed the Indian
01:14bowling that they are a pedestrian on a wicket like this. But credit to England openers.
01:22170 for Nolas. Amazing effort in the semi-final.
01:27They blew us away, isn't it? But let's go back quickly to the start of the game. Would
01:36you say there was a lack of intent from the Indian batsmen?
01:40I think India took it a bit easy in the sense, yes, lack of intent can be attributed to that
01:46because they were heavily reliant on the later-order batsmen like Suryakumar Yadav to give them
01:52that extra runs. But Achan, even another 20 runs wouldn't have mattered now. 25 runs wouldn't
01:58have mattered now, even the way England batters played. In hindsight, another 10-15 runs could
02:04have added more pressure on England. But I don't know if it would have made any difference
02:10because the way Butler and Hales were approaching the innings, they were looking at 220 maybe.
02:14So, that kind of a change. Another 4 overs still remain.
02:18Okay, 4 hours means even a target of 200 wouldn't have been enough.
02:22No, no chance. It was England's day all over.
02:26And not just that, from the beginning of the game itself, they were saying that this is
02:30quite a hard wicket and it is going to be a high-scoring game. So, which is why that
02:35168 was a below par total. But India never seemed like making a match of it.
02:40None of the batsmen except Pandya seemed to attack the England bowlers.
02:46I think what has happened is, Achan, two things. One, Kohli's role was more of a holding role.
02:53So, others were playing around him. And once you lost Suryakumar, Rohit and of course, Rahul left early.
03:02So, Suryakumar and Rohit must have been the guys who must have been given the role to play the attacking role.
03:10But once their wicket came in, I think Pandya needs some time to get into the groove.
03:17And then because England were bowling at very good places, areas basically.
03:24Because they were not giving fast balls, they were bowling the slow ones, they were bowling the cutters,
03:29they were bowling back of length. So, all this put together, I think India kind of lost the match between overs.
03:368-14 is where I would say India lost it. Otherwise, if they had probably gone for the extra runs at that point of time,
03:43another 20 runs would have been easy. But I think that time they played a bit safe game.
03:48And I think credit should be given to the England bowlers for keeping it quiet at that point of time.
03:54England spinners especially because Adil Rashid's 4 overs cost him only 20 runs and got away because of Suryakumar Yadav.
04:01Not just that, Livingstone was allowed to bowl 3 overs. These were overs where India should have accelerated.
04:09And that was actually quite dampening. There is very little time left to make up after that.
04:17But don't you think at that juncture, the areas you were saying, 8-14, shouldn't Kohli have stepped up?
04:24See, I think that's where maybe they have stuck to their own roles because they don't want to have more wickets from both ends.
04:32So that at least one set-batchman goes till the 15th. Otherwise, maybe India wouldn't have even got 168 if Kohli had got out at that point of time trying to go on the offensive.
04:41But the thing is, yes, one more aspect we need to also understand is, the wrist spinners were getting a lot of purchase out of this wicket.
04:53And unfortunately, India didn't have a single wrist spinner. So it was getting difficult to hit them.
04:59The ball was gripping and bouncing more than what you expect. So I think that was also another reason why Kohli or Pandya were not able to force the pace at that point of time.
05:09Now that you say about the wrist spinner, wasn't it a mistake to leave out Chahal?
05:14Sorry, I missed it.
05:17Wasn't it a mistake to leave out Chahal because of the kind of turn which Adil was getting?
05:23Absolutely. All others played in this World Cup excepting Chahal. I don't know why.
05:28And England traditionally has a weakness for leg spin. Dhore, Rashid, we all know how Lakshman Sivaramakrishnan used to get wickets of full tosses.
05:39So it would have been worth experimenting with Chahal in this game. Because anyway, Akshar Patel was absolutely a failure this entire tournament.
05:49He was getting hit almost by everybody, including last game by Zimbabwe.
05:53So I think in this game, instead of Akshar, India could have gone with Chahal as a variation.
06:00But again, they missed a chance in Zimbabwe. Maybe they didn't want to tamper and give Chahal the semifinals.
06:07But he is too good a bowler. He is an experienced bowler. I think you could have still brought him in.
06:11I think India missed a trick there. And he has played with Butler. He plays with Butler in Rajasthan Royals. So he knows him.
06:20So maybe India missed a trick there.
06:23England says, after the powerplay, there was no doubt that they would win, isn't it?
06:30Because the way Butler started it and Hales took off after that and again Butler coming back to finish it off.
06:35It was almost like taking turns to hammer Indian bowlers. Not just that, they target every single bowler.
06:43Correct. Correct. Sam, if you look at the first powerplay overs, what England scored, India almost scored that in the first 10 overs.
06:52Correct.
06:53So such was the intent of England openers. And I think they went about their task very well.
06:59What has also happened is, lack of imagination from the Indian bowlers played into their hands.
07:06They didn't do anything different. They were bowling at the right area. They were playing into England openers' hands.
07:13Maybe one of the reasons is the lack of pace, especially to Bhuvaneshwar Kumar. That was quite evident today.
07:19Because the way Butler was hitting him. And I think one or two balls only swung. But after that, there was no movement at all.
07:26So that made him a very pedestrian bowler where both Butler and Hales were able to get their timing right.
07:34And that gave them the confidence to go after the other bowlers. Maybe my thought is, Shami could have been utilised a little bit more in the first few more overs.
07:43When the new ball is there. But I don't know if it would have made any difference.
07:47Because it was complete domination, total domination from the England openers.
07:53Completely dominant performance from the England openers. But also, if you look at the England batting, it's heavily reliant on the openers.
08:03The matches where the openers are firing, they are winning easily.
08:08But one of them, especially the previous game where Stokes had to steady their milli-dings.
08:14Is it a concern heading into the final? Because Pakistan has got solid bowlers.
08:19Yes. But it is a concern. But I would say, it is not a major concern because these guys are class batsmen.
08:26Like Hales and Butler, they can play any attack. They have the capabilities. Maybe they need to take a little…
08:34But they can fail also, right? So that puts the pressure on the middle order.
08:37They can. But the fact remains, when they go to the final, I think they should not try to play the way they attacked India.
08:45They should probably play out the initial overs of Afridi and…
08:50Do you think they will do that? I don't think. I think they will continue to…
08:55I think they will continue. That's the beauty of T20, Shyam. You play just one way. You live or die.
09:03That's the way you play T20 cricket. But Butler is a different player altogether.
09:10He doesn't hit the ball hard. He plays with the timing. So, if he gets his timing again on a Melbourne wicket,
09:16maybe he will be a treat to watch. But it's going to be a tough task for him.
09:20And then Hales to repeat this feat, which is impossible. They were not able to do it against Zimbabwe.
09:26So, not Zimbabwe. Against smaller teams like Ireland or so.
09:30So, in that sense, it's going to be difficult. But it will give them a lot of confidence going into the final.
09:38Anyway, that's it from us. It's England marching into the final and India flying home empty-handed.
09:47So, we are in for a cracker of a final in Melbourne. That's on Sunday. We will catch you for the final between England and Pakistan.
09:59That's all from us today. But head over to our social media channels and gulfnews.com for the latest news and other developments.
10:07Thank you very much.