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Australia haven’t been up to the mark on their ongoing India tour and already lost two out of the four Border Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) 2023 matches. First, the Aussies faced a humiliating defeat by an innings and 132 runs in Nagpur, and then they failed to perform in the second clash as well.
The touring party’s inability to play spin in the subcontinent played an undeniable role in their consecutive rout against the hosts. In their second innings of the Delhi Test, Australia lost all their wickets to the spin duo of Ravindra Jadeja and Ravichandran Ashwin. While Jadeja picked seven wickets in the innings, Ashwin bagged three scalps.
Reacting to Australia’s poor run against India, former cricketer Michael Clarke has listed out some fallacies by the visiting side in their ongoing tour. While speaking on Big Sports Breakfast, Clarke said that not playing a practice game in India ahead of the BGT 2023 was a “major, major mistake” by the Aussie team.
“I’m not surprised by what I’m seeing because we didn’t have a tour game. Major, major, major mistake. There should have been at least one game over there to get used to the conditions,” said Clarke
The 41-year-old former Australia captain further termed his side’s sweep tactic against spinners another major mistake. Notably, five of the Australian batters got dismissed while attempting a sweep or reverse-sweep in the second innings of the Delhi Test.
“Selection for the first Test, major, major mistake. Second Test, blokes sweeping, we saw enough of that the first Test match. They’re not the right conditions to sweep when you start your innings. And they’re never going to be the right conditions to reverse sweep against the spin at the start of your innings.”
Next, Clarke lashed out at Pat Cummins‘ field placement and said: “At one stage, Patty Cummins had four blokes on the boundary. There’s 2½ days left in the Test match. You’re either bowling India out for under a hundred or you’re losing: one or the other.”
“If you lose in 20 overs, or you lose in two days, it’s irrelevant. So fielders get up, bat-pad off side, bat-pad leg side. If the ball turns, if the ball bounces, if the ball shoots along the ground, if you make an error in judgment, you are getting out,” added the former cricketer.
“That’s what Australia had to do with the ball. I know it’s only a tiny run lead, but we had to still try and win the game, and we had mid-off back, mid-on back, deep point, deep square leg. What was I watching?,” he concluded.
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