Winning a World Cup takes more than just good form: Was India a victim of its own success heading into the final?

To some extent, but it got very slow by the middle of the Indian innings. Faster again under lights as predicted, though there was also a lot more help to the Indian bowlers in the first ten overs than there was to the Aussies.

That was certainly the case with Gill & Kohli for sure. Both got out to indecision. As for the pitch being hard to score on, both Rohit and Kohli made it look pretty easy, as did Travis Head and Marnus didn't seem to be in much trouble, so not sure a lot of the pitch gremlins weren't in batsmen's minds?

That helped but it was more some nervous or indecisive shots from the top three, and then the pitch being hard to score on.

Not sure about the Plan B or great tactics and thinking by Australia. More a case of Indian batsmen showing themselves a bit nervous or more conservative in the final. And maybe a bit of luck for Australia, especially with the pitch. Don’t think I’ve seen Sharma mishit a lofted shot like that - playing across the line to a straight one. Kohli also played an indecisive shot to a good but not especially difficult ball from Cummins. Head played way more false shots than they did early on, but was able to play with much more freedom after that. India had played a “plan B” in match one when Kohli and Rahul chased down a low Australian total after being 3 down for not many. But what they hadn’t faced much was a slow and abrasive pitch with the ball starting to reverse. Their tail definitely a weakness. of a bit of luck going with Aus

You're pretty much right about Australia's 2007 WC campaign, which did include a number of big wins and it's fair to say none of Australia's games ended up being close. The England game was probably the closest - Aust chased down 248 with 16 balls and 7 wickets to spare - so still nearer comfortable than close. On the other hand, 2003 wasn't a procession. For a start, it was a bit of a special case for Australia as they'd come in under pressure from the Share Warne suspension, and while they ended up winning their opening game by a lot against Pakistan they had been in trouble batting first and it took 143* from Andrew Symonds to get them to a strong score. There was a real sense at that time that with Symonds coming of age they had a chance of overcoming Warne's loss, which had not looked any certainty before that. They were challenged strongly in the England pool game (needing an all-time all-round performance by Andy Bichel and a Michael Bevan special - chasing only 208, it took a 73 run 9th wicket partnership by those two to win a game they really should have lost). One or two of the other pool games weren't complete cakewalks, but at the end of the day the managed to start well but still save the best performance for last. You're correct that NZ had won all their games up to the final in 2015, but don't forget NZ played all its preliminary games, and its semi, at home. While NZ won all those games they certainly weren't unchallenged - they only beat Australia by 1 wicket, they had a real scare against Bangladesh and a fair bit of a one against Scotland, and won their semi against SA with precisely one ball to spare. They then played the final in different conditions in Melbourne. I'd say the change in conditions to ones suiting Australia much more than them (and a very strong Australian team) had more to do with their loss than any attitude issues or failure to time their run to the big occasion.

The final was won by us because India had a fatal flaw - their batting line-up was too short. They got away with it through dominance on home-style pitches so I suspect they never really understood their weakness. Their media is still full of how great their players are and how they're the best team; they drank their own bath water, they didn't view their team with objective eyes. I said to friends before the game that Australia would win, due to one reason only - India hadn't been under pressure the whole tournament, they wouldn't know how to react, and I was right. If you have to go into your shell and tick along at 3 runs an over for 30 over because you are 3 wickets down you are clearly not as good a team as you think you are.

Everything in context. Another way to look at it is if one of Rohit, Kohli or Rahul had gone on to make 100, the other two don't look like failures either. Marnus's 58 (albeit not out) would not have been as well regarded without Head's 137.

I think you've nailed it. India weren't allowed to bat as they had in previous games because of the bowling, fielding and tactics Australia used. Funny how Kohli's effort has been seen by many as a failure. Ditto with Rohit. I suppose they set the bar so high through the previous 10 games, that scores of 54 & 47 would seem like failures.

He wasn't able to go on with it, which was to India's detriment, especially the timing of his wicket, right in a moment where India probably should have looked to start pressing the scoring a bit more. They had to delay the push, or at least, that seems to be what they felt. Again, when Rahul got out, they had to delay the push. Could they have taken more risks? Maybe, but even without taking risks in the middle overs, they still got bowled out, so taking more riskscould easily have led to a smaller total. All in all, I think this points to an excellent bowling/fielding performance by Australia.

Certainly seemed that way and in fairness, he kinda did his part, but only Rohit Sharma played the role batting role expected from him in this tournament. The others were underwhelming, so maybe they should have thought up Plan D. Or maybe that's what we watched on Sunday

Plan B and C was Kohli to the rescue. :cricket: :shocked:

I guess we're not likely to know for sure, one way or the other, unless someone in the Indian camp comes out with a "tell all" book about the series

Beg to differ.

It was the postulating, self-serving adulation in the pool rounds. So blinking what if Virat bhai outdoes Sachin bhai's ODI century tally or whatever. Come down to it, no one thought about giving India's nose a honk until the final - Cummins and his team pulled off the scam with a game plan and then executed. When the iceberg hit the Titanic there were no lifeboats, no plan B, and even if there was they had not have any trigger to pull out a plan B.

Fair point. I may have been a bit unfair there

A very good summary. I think there are elements of most of the points raised in this article with one exception - "India played like a coterie of eleven individual superstars nervously monitoring their net worth in endorsements and IPL value". I never got the impression the Indian players were trying to do anything but win games and ultimately the tournament. They were clearly outplayed and outthought tactically in one game, the final, but before that, they played some excellent cricket as a team. As The Crowd said, they had a Plan A, which worked beautifully for 10 games, but no Plan B. Throw in a dose of stage fright/nerves, brought on by pressure of a billion fans and the media and it added up to difficulties too great to overcome.

I believe this article is on point. I would add one more. A bit of arrogance and over confidence, perhaps from the supporters but it touched our players as well, comparing ourselves with that all conquering Australia of 2003. I do not think particularly that winning all matches is counter productive. Australia won 2003,2007 without being challenged. In 2007 the closest match was played by Australia vs South Africa in league matches where Australia won by 80 odd if i remember correctly. It is about putting 11 who have been tried and tested. Teams like Australia, New Zealand groom their players with these experience from their state cricket. Here, we are overly dependent on a core group of players to get us through while others just play around them. The Final match exactly played out how i called it in the morning of the match. The reason why Australia broke tradition of batting first in Finals is because of their confidence from the semi final, as well as from their group stage matches. It does not matter if you huff and puff across the line or do it in canter, the fact always remains constant that, Australia wins. That is what happened in final. After winning the semi against a team that was known for putting big score batting first, winning against probably one of best all round bowling cartel chasing when the ball was turning squarely, Australia knew they had their 11 who would win no matter what, dew or no dew. New Zealand went unbeaten in 2015 world cup up until final, we were unbeaten in 2015 up until semi final, these do not mean much. I knew what was going to happen the moment South Africa lost that match.

At the same time, what were India meant to do? It's not their fault that their opponents prior to the final didn't put up enough of a challenge.

Just another in a long line of dominating sides getting beaten at the post. More often than not, the losing side assumed they were going to win, and didn’t count on the challenger throwing curve balls. As you say, the bowling first, the fielding, the chopping and changing, they all contributed to throwing India off its stride, and India didn’t know how to respond.

Yes TC. All of the above IMO contributed, spot on. All through the tournament India and the BCCI got what they wanted, a quick sugar-hit. Cruise control, bask in the adulation of the adoring public. Somehow they got the frenzy of the Dutch in the very last pool match. I said to a mate the fan base would will a toss win because it would be the only way they can pile on a 400 run total. They certainly weren't going to get a tight chase. And so it eventuated. Commentators went ecstatic over the accumulation of sixes hit (was there some bounty for them?) and centuries accumulated by individuals. Irrelevant. The side went into the playoff simply underdone and they have no one to blame but themselves.