Australia’s Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood rejoice the wicket of South Africa’s Rassie van der Dussen throughout their semi-final match in the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023, at Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Thursday.
| Photo Credit: ANI
Bracing up for the World Cup closing against India, a staff he describes as one with out “any real weaknesses”, Australian pacer Josh Hazlewood says he noticed a “few cracks” whereas rattling their top-order in their match opener.
Australia, who misplaced that recreation in Chennai by six wickets after decreasing India to three/2 in the second over, arrange a big-ticket title showdown against the formidable hosts with a nervy three-wicket win over South Africa right here on Thursday.
In the match build-up, the 2 groups had been engaged in a three-match ODI collection with India profitable 2-1.
“We got one in the series, lost that 2-1, but no, we’ve played them a lot of times. We know them inside out, same with them.
“They’re a high quality staff, they have been on a march the entire match, no real weaknesses in their staff, so, yeah, sit up for taking part in them on Sunday,” Hazlewood said of India after the win over South Africa.
The pacer added, “I suppose we noticed a number of cracks after we performed them in Chennai chasing a small goal, we had been fortunate sufficient to get a pair early.”
India bowled out Australia for 199 in their first game in the showpiece.
It will be a repeat of the 2003 World Cup final which a batting-heavy Australia won in a lopsided contest.
Hazlewood, who rocked the South African batting along with fellow new ball bowler Mitchell Starc, hoped they would recreate their magic against India in the final in Ahmedabad on Sunday.
Hazlewood and Starc got plenty of early movement and bounce with the new ball to leave South Africa reeling for 24/4 after the first 13 overs, setting the tone for their win.
“I believe there was sufficient there on the wicket. It seemed like each time they went to play a shot, we obtained a wicket. They kind of needed to knuckle again down and try to see it out,” Hazlewood told reporters.
“Yeah, Starc and I’ve bowled collectively for a very long time now, we all know one another’s video games, and we each play properly on the identical evening, which is agreeable.
“Hopefully, we can do that on Sunday as well, but… yeah, there’s a little bit in the wicket which we probably haven’t had, in the previous games, or in a couple here and there, but it was nice to get the ball on,” he added.
Hazlewood credited Starc for preserving it easy against South Africa.
The left-arm fast returned with sensible figures of 10-1-34-3, whereas Hazlewood bagged 2/12 from his eight overs with three maidens.
“You don’t try and chase it too much either. You know there’s enough there, you’ve just got to put the ball in the right area, but easier said than undone sometimes.
“Starc keeping it simple… don’t go over-attacking. We know that they’ve sort of got six front-line batters, and Marco’s (Jansen) had a great, great tournament at seven, so if we can make early in-roads, we know they’re set up for the back-end as well.”
“So early wickets simply put them on the again foot, and we’re fortunate sufficient to try this tonight (Thursday),” he stated.
