Completely on expected lines
No, I’m not referring only to Steve Bucknor's appointment for yesterday's game, but also the actual way the much-hyped 'clash of the tournament' panned out.
A target of 250 was never going to be a problem for Australia. While a lot was written and spoken about the bowlers having an off-day, the fact is that on a good batting surface, India needed to have at least two batsmen making big scores.
Virender Sehwag and Rahul Dravid were both out without making the hundreds that they ought to have, once they’d settled in nicely. Sehwag’s dismissal for 65 was perhaps the turning point of the game, since it meant Dravid and Kaif would have to rebuild the innings, prevent a collapse and set the stage for Dhoni (the only one capable of making quick runs late in the innings in Yuvraj’s absence) to provide the impetus at the end of the innings.
You can write all you want about the bowlers screwing up, but in my opinion, it was the batsmen who messed up.
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Thanks for the comment on my post. Here's what I think...
While I agree that 249 wasn't a winning score against the Aussies, the general scoring trend in the series thus far and the form of the Indian batsmen meant that 249 was a score worth bowling at. And with Indian bowlers having acquitted themselves admirably well in the earlier games, one expected them to handle the situation better than they did! Given the pressures of a 'must-win' match, the batsmen held up better under the pressure than the bowlers.
By 
Sameer (31 Oct 2006, 12:22:00 pm)
sameer: While the trend may have been lower scores, that was on wickets which were tougher to bat on. I didn't think that Mohali pitch had any real problems. Dravid and Sehwag were batting beautifully. If they'd hung around for 10 overs more, Australia would have been in serious trouble.
By Jagadish (1 Nov 2006, 12:19:00 am)
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