“How the bloody hell did we win that?”
That was how Mark Waugh had summed up his team’s win against West Indies in the 1996 World Cup semifinal.
At the Trent Bridge on Thursday, if one were a fly on the wall in the Australian dressing room, the 15-run win that Aaron Finch’s side managed to pull off, might well have been described the same way.
Stirring Aussie fightback
Let’s get one thing out of the way: even if the West Indies players insisted it was not the case, it would not be an oversimplification to say that, in the final analysis, the umpiring cost them. When Chris Gayle should have been facing a free hit, he received a delivery that ended his eventful stay in the middle. Chris Gaffaney seemed like a man on a mission to send Gayle back to the pavilion and he succeeded on his third attempt. Yes, it can be annoying to reduce a 100-over match to a case of what-if over one delivery but that’s not unwarranted in this scenario.
Having said that, West Indies had enough opportunities to put the game beyond Australia. Opting to bowl, the West Indies bowlers picked up where they left off against Pakistan a few days earlier.
Aaron Finch: edged a peach of a rising good-length delivery from Oshane Thomas.
David Warner: a fairly innocuous delivery from Sheldon Cottrell, hit to point.
Usman Khawaja: Roughed up by a barrage of bouncers, then threw his bat at a full ball.
Glenn Maxwell: Second ball he faced, a nothing pull shot. “The Big Show is a no-show,” said Michael Slater on air.
The scoreboard read 38/4 and the defending champions were on the ropes.
From there on they, as a team, pulled off a Kapil Dev-at-Turnbridge-Wells.
Only one team in World Cup history has made more runs than Australia managed to after losing four wickets for fifty runs or fewer. That’s elite company to be in, given the magnitude of Kapil Dev’s unbeaten 175.
There was not one great innings like that of Kapil’s that day, when the world did not get to watch it. But with millions watching around the world this time around, Steve Smith and Nathan Coulter-Nile took Australia to a score that seemed near impossible one hour into the match.
Now, we all know West Indies love their Twenty20 cricket, but it seemed like they lost their mojo after the 20-over mark in this match. Australia’s score after first 20 overs was 83/5. From there on they lost just one wicket in the next 20 overs and eventually ended up scoring 205/5 in the last 30 overs.
While Smith took his time, playing out the initial few overs cautiously, Coulter-Nile came out all guns blazing. Batting at No 8, he did not show any fear facing up to the barrage of bouncers early on: even if he did not have a clue as to the direction of the short balls, he stood up bravely and pulled, hooked instinctively.
Soon after he came out to bat, he started playing catch up with Smith. The former Aussie captain reached his fifty (accompanied by boos from the Nottingham crowd) and then Coulter-Nile exploded at the end.
Only one man in the history of ODIs has made a higher score than Coulter-Nile batting at No 8. No one has scored more than him at the World Cup batting that low down.
From 38/4, Australia finished on 288. A truly remarkable comeback.
Starc delivers
Sure, when the West Indies batting effort started, Mitchell Starc produced a superb opening spell in the company of Pat Cummins. Sure, he got the wicket of Gayle, in aforementioned circumstances. But it was Starc’s effort at the end that was truly brilliant.
First, he got the decisive wicket of Andre Russell (or gifted by the Windies’ all-rounder). Then, coming back for the final spell, he dismissed Carlos Brathwaite and Jason Holder in one over: the two wickets that, for the last time, pulled the match back in Australia’s favour. Starc’s last two overs were: 1 0 W 0 0 W 0 1lb W 0 0 0. One run (off the bat), three wickets and the match sealed in the favour of the defending champions.
We have seen this before. Many a time. In the 1996 semi-final against West Indies, when Stuart Law led the Aussie fightback with the bat before Shane Warne helped pull off a miracle.
In the 1999 semi-final, when Michael Bevan and Steve Waugh led the fightback with the bat, before Warne (with more than a little help from South Africa) helped pull off a miracle. In 2003 against England, when Andy Bichel pulled off an unforgettable all-round performance. The list is long and memorable.
This is the stuff that, to borrow a cliche, champions are made of. This is the reason hundreds of thousands support Australia (not just Australians, mind you). This is also the reason fans of other teams often get fed up (with a begrudging appreciation). Like Coulter-Nile said, “If we had got bowled out for 150, we’d still back ourselves.”
The win at Trent Bridge was proof that even when the aura of invincibility around them is diminishing you cannot take the fight out of them. Not at the World Cup.
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