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At the World Cup, India has made it ten out of ten.
Even if the victory margin of 70 runs sounds substantial enough, they have been
clinical almost the entire time, ruling both with the bat and the ball.
However, that wasn’t quite the case on Wednesday in Mumbai in the semi-final
against New Zealand. It was one of the hardest games India have played in this
World Cup, according to captain Rohit Sharma, who also said that his team
needed to “stay collected” and “take the semi-final out of the
equation” in order to win.
Despite their impressive score, Daryl Mitchell and
Kane Williamson put up a strong third-wicket partnership of 181 runs in 149
balls, putting the Wankhede crowd to sleep. Mitchell scored an 85-ball hundred,
while Williamson scored a determined half-century.
“The way our bowlers came and bowled up front
with the new ball, getting those wickets… when you have a target [India scored
397] like that, you’ve got to take wickets upfront. And we did that
exactly,” Rohit said on Star Sports after the game. “Today being the
semi-finals, I wouldn’t say that there was no pressure. Whenever you play the
game, there is always pressure, and obviously semi-final adds a bit of extra
there. But I think the guys were doing the job.
“To be honest, we wanted to take that semi-final
out of the equation, not to think too much about it. We just wanted to keep
doing what we’ve been doing in the first nine games that we played, and things
came off for us really nicely in the second half as well.”
Additionally, India lost Williamson when Mohammed
Shami spilled a sitter at mid-on and failed to capitalise on a run-out
opportunity as the two batted together. By then, New Zealand had taken the lead
in the chase. But in the 33rd over, Shami, who had taken the first two wickets,
returned to provide the breakthrough by taking Williamson’s wicket.
“When the scoring rate is above nine all the
time, you got to keep taking your chances,” Rohit said. “Sometimes it
comes off and sometimes it doesn’t. They gave us chances, we didn’t take them.
But credit to them as well in the middle, Mitchell and Williamson batted
brilliantly.
“I’ve played a lot of cricket here [at the
Wankhede]. So I know any score on this ground… you cannot relax, you got to
get the job done as quickly as possible and stay at it. We knew there will be
pressure on us at some stage there will be partnership. We just got to stay
collected and I think that’s what we did. We were calm even though we were a
bit sloppy on the field. But that can happen. We’ve got nine perfect games on
the field. So, these things are bound to happen. But I’m glad that we could get
the job done in the end.”