Australian skipper Steve Smith cut a despondent figure on Sunday night after his side received another battering at the hands of a superior India.
After halting India’s march in the fourth one-day international, Australia started the final game with plenty of confidence and looked like they would set India a huge target. But, in what has now become a familiar sight, the Aussies suffered two massive implosions to lose their way completely. Smith, tired of seeing his side repeat the same mistakes, admitted they were not good enough.
“We showed some glimpses throughout the series that we could play, but we’ve been losing wickets in clumps very consistently and that’s not good enough. The top four need to stand up and really take control. We did that in a couple of games, last game in Bangalore to be particular. But we are not doing it consistently enough. We are giving ourselves the chance to really go hard at the back end of the game and getting with partnerships in the middle, something we need to look at,” said Smith at the post match press conference on Sunday.
“We had a chat after our second game, it was about playing the spinners and hitting the ball down the ground. I thought we did that in a couple of games and then today Virat (Kohli) set some really good fields and stopped us from hitting and I don’t think we adapted well enough. Today was probably a day when we could have used softer hands, played a bit square and hit the ball into the gaps instead of actually hitting the ball down the ground. We probably didn’t adapt as well as we would have liked to. We weren’t good enough and were outplayed by India.”
New players coming in
Smith didn’t rule out bringing in fresh blood in upcoming tournaments in a bid to script a turnaround. “There are possibly a few guys. Some guys are back playing the domestic one-day competition at the moment and yeah, there are some guys there that can put some pressure on the guys that are here. Obviously the results haven’t been good enough and we want our guys to perform consistently. We will have a good look at the one-day competition back home and hopefully a few guys can jump out of the pack and score big runs and bowl really well as well.”
After halting India’s march in the fourth one-day international, Australia started the final game with plenty of confidence and looked like they would set India a huge target. But, in what has now become a familiar sight, the Aussies suffered two massive implosions to lose their way completely. Smith, tired of seeing his side repeat the same mistakes, admitted they were not good enough.
“We showed some glimpses throughout the series that we could play, but we’ve been losing wickets in clumps very consistently and that’s not good enough. The top four need to stand up and really take control. We did that in a couple of games, last game in Bangalore to be particular. But we are not doing it consistently enough. We are giving ourselves the chance to really go hard at the back end of the game and getting with partnerships in the middle, something we need to look at,” said Smith at the post match press conference on Sunday.
“We had a chat after our second game, it was about playing the spinners and hitting the ball down the ground. I thought we did that in a couple of games and then today Virat (Kohli) set some really good fields and stopped us from hitting and I don’t think we adapted well enough. Today was probably a day when we could have used softer hands, played a bit square and hit the ball into the gaps instead of actually hitting the ball down the ground. We probably didn’t adapt as well as we would have liked to. We weren’t good enough and were outplayed by India.”
New players coming in
Smith didn’t rule out bringing in fresh blood in upcoming tournaments in a bid to script a turnaround. “There are possibly a few guys. Some guys are back playing the domestic one-day competition at the moment and yeah, there are some guys there that can put some pressure on the guys that are here. Obviously the results haven’t been good enough and we want our guys to perform consistently. We will have a good look at the one-day competition back home and hopefully a few guys can jump out of the pack and score big runs and bowl really well as well.”
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