India vs Australia: 2nd T20I- Who Said What

The second T20 International between India and Australia turned out to be a closely-fought affair. In the end, the visitors, led by Aaron Finch, won the match at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore by seven wickets courtesy of a masterful knock from Glenn Maxwell. With the stupendous triumph, the Aussies clinched the T20I series 2-0. Virat Kohli also lost his maiden series on home soil.

Kohli comes to the party

KL Rahul and Shikhar Dhawan took India off to a blistering start courtesy of a 61-run stand off 43 balls. However, Dhawan couldn’t time the ball properly and crawled to 14 from 24 balls before falling prey to left-arm pacer Jason Behrendroff. At the other end, Rahul was in a different zone and he racked up 47 runs from 26 balls with three fours and four sixes. He perished to Nathan Coulter Nile in the eighth over.

Rishabh Pant flattered to deceive yet another time and became D’Arcy Short’s victim. Then Virat Kohli and MS Dhoni took the onus upon themselves and accumulated 100 runs for the fourth wicket. The Indian captain got to his fifty in 29 balls and remained not out on 72 from 38 balls with a couple of fours and six over-boundaries. Dhoni notched 40 from 23 and India raced to 190 for four in their 20 overs.

Maxwell wrecks havoc

The visiting team didn’t make the greatest of starts as skipper Aaron Finch and Marcus Stoinis perished cheaply. Runs were hard to come by initially, but Australia didn’t panic. Short put on a handy 40 runs from 28 balls to inject momentum into the innings. At the other end, Glenn Maxwell went berserk and took the attack to the opposition. Most importantly, the right-hander blended caution with aggression.

He got to his half-century in 28 balls and then went on to storm to his third T20I century in a mere 50 balls. Maxwell didn’t spare anyone and kept surging ahead. He was severe on Siddarth Kaul as the Indians looked in utter bewilderment. With nine runs needed in the last over, he smacked a four and a six off Kaul to take the Aussies over the line with two balls to spare. Maxwell ended on 113 from 55.

Peter  Handscomb said

Happy to see Maxi bat the way he did. That was the best seat in the house to watch that and it was a privilege from my end. I’ve been working on that one (the shot over extra cover) so it’s nice to get done in the game and I was trying to get Maxi on strike and take the game as deep as possible. This will give us a lot of confidence going into the ODIs and it’s something we spoke about in the team meetings and we wanted to make sure we got in-batters at the end as it was batters job to do. Maxi stood up today and that can give the whole batting group a lot of confidence going forward. He (Maxi) is a freak. he can play all those shots that other people can’t play and he’s just maturing with each game.

Virat Kohli, the Indian captain, said

Pretty short series to summarize the performances. Australia outplayed us in all departments and deserved to win. 190 is a good total on most grounds but if there is so much dew as there was tonight and when you have an innings like what Glenn Maxwell played, nothing much you can do. Every team is looking to take each game like that but it’s also important to win matches. We would have liked to get across the line in at least this game but I can’t be too hard on the bowlers due to the amount of dew.

We wanted to give everyone some game time, we’ve seen how they react under pressure, there is a series coming up and we’ll try more things. It’s upto them to deliver the goods. The good thing was that the Bangalore wicket was back to normal and you could trust the lengths. I enjoyed myself but it didn’t really matter as we lost the game.

Glenn Maxwell, the Player of the Match and Series, said

It feels really good. We haven’t had a lot of success here of late. To come over here and perform like we have has started it off well for us on this tour. It helps a big bulk of T20 cricket in the domestic tournament back home. Having confidence in my game also has helped a lot and it feels great to contribute to two special wins.

Was a pretty good wicket and we could afford to wait for the loose balls. We knew that it could be easier against the quicks, anything around 12 rpo, we fancied to chase that down. After D’Arcy’s dismissal, it was upto me to drive the rest of the innings. Handscomb did a great job in giving me the strike all the time. We had a lot of chaos in the last game but we corrected that tonight.

Aaron Finch, the Australian captain, said

Anytime that you can win any kind of series against India in India is truly special. Glenn Maxwell was truly sensational tonight but I thought Adam Zampa was the difference between the two sides. To go for just 23 runs on that kind of a wicket was really remarkable. We’ve been on a journey for the last 10-11 months building upto the World Cup and there has been some pain during the journey. We’ve done well to take the blows but also have made some progress, hoping to peak at the right time for the World Cup.

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