India vs Australia 1st ODI: Never easy chasing 160 with two new balls, says Steve Smith after defeat in 1st ODI

Steve Smith said that partnership between MS Dhoni and Hardik Pandya turned the game around. (Reuters Photo)

Steve Smith expressed that the presence of two new balls in a 21-over game put them at a disadvantage when chasing 164. The Australia said that one new ball would have made things easier for his team. Australia were chasing a revised target of 164 runs after the second innings against India was reduced to 21 overs due to rain in Chennai on Sunday.

“It was never going to be easy chasing 160 with two new balls. I think 160 with one new ball would have made things a lot easier,” Smith said. “When you have two new balls from both ends, as you saw the whole game, we took three wickets with the new ball and they found it quite hard. It was the same for us. When you are playing 20 overs, you don’t have a great deal of time to make things up. You need eight an over basically from ball one. It was difficult in that aspect. Perhaps we could have been a little bit more defensive at the start, keep wickets in hand and went harder later.”

Australia had perfectly set up the game for themselves. As Smith mentioned, the pacers had taken early wickets after India won the toss and decided to bat. Pat Cumming and Nathan Coulter-Nile reduced India to 11 for 3 before a stunning partnership of 118 runs for the sixth wicket between Hardik Pandya and MS Dhoni took India to 281 for 7 in 50 overs. Smith rued the chances his side missed after having the game under control.

“You always want to take your catches,” Smith said. “I obviously dropped one early and one that sort of yorked me as well – the Hardik Pandya’s one, I couldn’t get my hands underneath it. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to capitalise on what was a very good start. 5 for 87 and then I think it was 6 for 206 (205). That partnership [between Dhoni and Pandya] turned out to be a match-winning one. I thought MS and Hardik played very well.

“I think we probably we went away from our plans a little bit. We were hitting such a good length and certainly persisted with that for a while with the good bouncers we were bowling. We were trying too many things, too many slower balls, just not hitting that good hard length we were hitting early on. That partnership changed the game. They put 120 odd (118) and took them from 87 to 206 (205). In the end that proved to be a match-winning partnership.”

Pandya made a 66-ball 83 and Dhoni ended up making 79. Both were slow to start but Pandya timed his attack to perfection against spinners. After he was dismissed, Dhoni took over and launched an onslaught in the final overs especially targeting James Faulkner.

Smith said he wanted to wrap the Indian innings early so when Pandya got out, he brought Coulter-Nile back but he failed to pick wickets and was bowled out. Unfortunately for Smith, he had to finish to Faulkner.

“I had in my plan to begin with that Coulter-Nile and finish with Cummins. But when we got the wicket of Hardik, I thought it was an opportunity to bring Coulter-Nile back on and go for the throat. Another wicket or two there, we could have bowled India out. So that was my decision at that point in time. Obviously MS hit Jimmy (James Faulkner) pretty well in the end. It wasn’t ideal but that’s cricket.”