Australia executed plans with cerebral precision on their way to their sixth World Cup title victory ©Getty
As Australia finished their practice session on the eve of the World Cup final at around 4.30 pm on Saturday (November 18), there was one Indian occupying the think-tank's attention more than anyone else. No, it wasn't Virat Kohli or Rohit Sharma. It wasn't even the deadly pace duo of Jasprit Bumrah or Mohammed Shami. The opposition player being discussed the most instead was Shreyas Iyer.
The Mumbai right-hander was coming off back-to-back centuries against the Netherlands and then New Zealand in the semi-final. Both those tons had also come off 60 and 70 deliveries respectively. And the Australians had decided that while Kohli was the highest run-getter for India in the tournament, apart from being a historic thorn in their side, the match-changing damage would come from Iyer.
He was the one they needed to eliminate early, not just because he was a dangerous threat, but also because that would change the dynamic of the Indian middle-order. The idea was to make sure that they get Kohli and KL Rahul batting together as early as possible, more so due to the dry and drab nature of the pitch at the Narendra Modi Stadium. That outcome, they believed, would ensure that India struggle to get to their customarily gargantuan total like they had in the tournament before, especially with Ravindra Jadeja and Suryakumar Yadav not having had much of a hit in the weeks leading up to the final. The perfect ploy to expose and exploit India's only real issue of note leading into the big game.
Even Andrew McDonald and his highly experienced and shrewd coaching staff would not have expected the plan to be executed with this cerebral precision. For, just like the ideal scenario that they'd drawn up in the war room, the Australian bowlers led by captain Pat Cummins, and a freak catch from Travis Head, had ensured that Kohli and Rahul were batting together on the sluggish surface by the 11th over.
As it turned out, Cummins needed only one delivery to get rid of Iyer. But It's the intensity in the captain's body language before he ran in to bowl, as he moved his fielders around rather animatedly, that set the wicket up.
It was Cummins's first delivery to Iyer. The field couldn't have been set more obviously to telegraph a short ball. Four fielders on the boundary, all behind square, two each on the off and on side. Three in-fielders on the leg-side including a square-leg and mid-on but no mid-off. The cover fielder too meanwhile was in a catching position, closer to the batter than the 30-yard circle.
Understandably, Iyer's weight remained on the backfoot, as he stayed rooted to his crease and more on-side than usual. It meant that he was in an awkward position to counter the length delivery on off-stump from the Australian captain, which always has that shape into the right-hander, and resulted in him pushing at it down the wrong line and getting an outside-edge through to the wicket-keeper. The plan had worked. The threat had been diffused without any damage. And the celebration from Cummins was a giveaway of how dependent Australia's tactic to strangle India was on Iyer's early dismissal.
Iyer had only managed 4 runs, courtesy a boundary off Glenn Maxwell off the last ball of the first powerplay. That would be the last boundary India would score for 98 deliveries. Just like McDonald and his team had envisaged, all Kohli and Rahul seemed content to do with the pitch slowing down further with every over, and the lack of in-form batters to come, was nudge and nurdle and keep the score ticking along. Australia had already won the first few rounds of this heavyweight contest. Then came the collateral damage that they'd then foreseen.
With the scoring rate having dropped to nothing more than a canter, and Rahul taking his time to build his innings, Kohli could no longer play the role that he'd played so magnificently till this point in the World Cup. The onus for once was on him to take the game by force and take on the Australian bowlers. And literally his first effort to do so, as he tried pushing a length delivery slightly away from his body from Cummins ended up with him inside-edging on to his stumps. Even if he had still used his class to get himself to a half-century. Another big moment of the final had already gone Australia's way resoundingly.
Australia had if anything already drawn first blood at the toss itself. The strong position they'd got into with the Kohli wicket was only possible due to Cummins's bold call of putting India to bat, what they've wanted to do throughout the tournament. So much so that even Rohit Sharma looked a little perplexed as he signalled to his teammates that they'd be batting first.
McDonald, Vettori, Di Venuto and Flower were right in the mix as soon as the team bus arrived at the Narendra Modi Stadium at around noon on Sunday. They made a beeline for the pitch, rubbed and felt it up at different spots in a good length area, before the head coach sought out his captain for a long chat.
And like has been a hallmark of the Cummins-McDonald era, the courageous call had been made on the back of a lot of analysis, a lot of well-thought-out scenarios and a lot of well-strategized ideas from McDonald & Co with some of the senior players chipping in. Along with of course a big dollop of fortitude. It wasn't an easy decision, and it's not surprising that some experts back home have deemed it as one of the bravest calls ever made in the history of Australian sport. Not to forget a complete buy-in from Cummins and his players.
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