Rahul Dravid is disappointed to finish in the semifinals. Probably would have certainly liked to go a couple of steps further. But, yeah, just outplayed our class today.
They were the better team in all departments, really, and the school line showed that stuff, honestly, after a loss like this. But we reflect on it. I mean, it’s tough to reflect on things so close to the result, but, yeah, I think overall, we ran a pretty good campaign over the last year.
We’ve played some good T20 cricket even in this tournament. I think we’ve had our moments. There’s been some real individual quality from a lot of our players, showing some really good skills, but on the day, we were just not good enough here. And I’m sure that when you lose in a semifinal, yes, I know it’s disappointing, but, yeah, I’m sure there are things that we can look back on and reflect on and see that we’ve improved in and we can take forward and move forward as we build for the next World Cup. Honestly, we looked at those things.
We looked at that as well but also runs on the board was something in a semifinal. We had been batting well. We were one of those teams that were even in these conditions, scoring 181 80 plus. I think we’ve done it two or three times, three times, I think, in this tournament. So we were playing well. It’s just I think maybe when the game started, the boys were saying it was a little bit tacky, it was a little bit slower.
Having said that, they bowled really well. I thought they were really good up front. They hit a really good lens and didn’t really let us get away. And we felt at that 15 hours mark, we were probably 1520 short, and we really had a really good last five overs, I thought Hardek was out there and was absolutely brilliant.
And that’s exactly I mean, in the end, it looked like we were a lot shorter than even 1520, but I think we should have been able to get 181 85 on that weekend. It would have been maybe things might have been different with an early weekend after that.
Rahul Dravid – Oh, it’s too early to talk about it right now. It’s just after a semifinal game, these guys have been terrific performers for us, and like you said, we have a couple of years to reflect on it. There’s some really good quality players here, so absolutely not the right time to, you know, talk about this stuff or think about this stuff right now. We’ll have enough games, and enough matches as we go on ahead, and India will try and build and prepare for the next World Cup. Yeah, no, he’s a very dangerous player, and we knew the key to the game also, obviously, was to try and break that opening partnership as early as we could. We tried to attack a little bit with our lens upfront. We thought that was a tactic. They played that really well. The ball didn’t swing here probably as much as it has in other parts of Australia or in other conditions. Played a little bit into their hands. And class players like that, both Butler and Hills, I thought their partnership was fantastic today. I think they just put the pressure on us, never let that go. And even when our spinners came on, on a weekend that we thought we might be able to control the game, or they really counterattacked as spinners as well, and put us in under a lot of pressure. So really well played. I mean, a class player, I’m someone like Butler, someone who’s, you know, I don’t need me to say that, but he’s just got he’s probably one of the most dangerous T 20 players going around. Well, I think they played well. I mean, that’s the reality of it. You know, I thought they played really well. Once they got off to that kind of start, I think they could really sit back and control the run rate. We had 168. They brought that run rate down to six and a half. I think by the time the 6th over was finished, or seven runs and over, and then on a small ground like that, they were always in control. So they were going to control that game. They didn’t really need to take too many risks. They could sit back and not that they didn’t take them. They played some very good shots right through. But, yeah, I mean, these things happen. It’s disappointing. Tobacco I’m not sure is the right word, but disappointing. Certainly
we put the pressure back on them, but definitely outline play is formatting.
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