Rave about Rinku Singh, Surya and Kishan but don’t forget Mukesh Kumar in India’s win vs Australia
Spare a thought for the India and Australia cricketers and the fans! After close to two months of 50-overs cricket in the World Cup and a heartbreak in the final, they got just four days to switch to T20s – a different format where the dynamics change with each ball, plans go for a toss quite often and boundaries outnumber dot balls and gap the between bat and ball is wider than ever. Till November 19 the batters had to deal with the new ball if batting under the night skies, or the slowness of the pitch in the middle overs while batting first. The bowlers were in the game but come Thursday, it was one-way traffic – see the ball the hit ball.
India’s Mukesh Kumar reacts during the first T20I against Australia(PTI)
There was no change in that notion in the India vs Australia 1st T20I in Visakhapatnam. The pitch was a placid one, the margin for error was minimal for bowlers and it was a battle of boundaries between the batters of sides. In that, India edged out Australia by two wickets to a 1-0 lead in the five-match series.
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On a day where 417 runs were scored in 40 overs of cricket and 53 fours and 20 sixes were smashed, it is natural that the cynosure of the eyes would be the batters. It was Jos Inglis for Australia. Promoted to bat at No.3, the right-handed wicketkeeper-batter smashed his maiden T20I century with eight sixes to finish with a staggering 110 off 50 balls. It was mainly due to his heroics and a half-century from Steve Smith that Australia posted 208 after batting first.
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India lost their openers early in the chase but Ishan Kishan and Suryakumar Yadav got stuck into the Aussie bowlers. The duo put on a 111-run stand for the third wicket. Kishan fell for 58 off 39 while captain Surya smashed 80 off 42. In the end, it was young Rinku Singh with the finishing touches with an ice-cool 22* off 14 balls as India pulled off their highest successful run-chase in T20Is.
Surya, Kishan, and Rinku deservingly get the lion’s share of the credit but one should not forget the effort Mukesh Kumar put in with the ball. When Prasidh Krishna, Arshdeep Singh, spinners Ravi Bishnoi and Axar Patel were being taken to the cleaners by Smith and Inglis, it was Mukesh who provided some relief to India.
On a belter of a track, the right-arm pacer from Bengal landed his yorkers perfectly and mixed it up with the occasional short delivery and the slower one to keep the Australian batters honest.
It was because of him that Australia could not go past 220. Mukesh hit as many as five yorkers in the last over and gave away only five runs (+ 1 bye).
Mukesh gets stamp of approval from captain Surya
Captain Suryakumar did not forget to highlight the importance of Mukesh’s spell in India’s win. “It was huge,” the skipper said about Mukesh.”The way all three fast bowlers pulled us back into the game after 16 overs. Incredible achievement.”In fact, with no dew, chasing could have been tricky but it wasn’t, conceded Surya.
“Thought there would be a little bit of dew but there wasn’t. It isn’t a big ground and I knew batting would get easy. Thought they might get 230-235 but the bowlers did really well,” the skipper seemed satisfied.
Former India opener Aakash Chopra also lauded Mukesh Kumar’s efforts.
“Mukesh Kumar’s final over was simply terrific. He gave away only five runs in that over and it included a no ball which was followed by a free hit. But the precision with which he bowled all the yorkers tied the batsmen down. If he had given away something like 15 runs in that over, India would have been chasing anything close to 220 runs, and that would have made things even more difficult for the side,” he said in JioCinema’s daily sports show ‘#AAKASHVANI’.
