World Cup 2023 – Honest Analysis of the Heartbreak

It’s been some days now since the heart crushing loss of Cricket World Cup 2023 and hopefully the heads & hearts are a little calmer and the dust has started to settle. We can now probably revisit this one last time before moving on. 

World Cup 2023 Final is another knockout loss and another heartbreak for the Indian team and Indian fans. The world remains too much focused on the misses of South African and New Zealand teams but in a country whose primary sport in all respects is cricket, we somehow always fail to collectively ask the pertinent questions in the aftermath of such a result. We continue to oscillate between extreme admiration or euphoria and extreme discontent fringing on the lines of rage.

Let’s try to have a slightly calmed down review of World Cup 2023 Final, but with extremely relevant, valid and puzzling observations. This will be a brutal yet an objective assessment of the World Cup 2023 Final between India and Australia.

First of all, let’s try to be a centrist with the assessment which in itself is a herculean task in this day and age, where reviews, opinions, debates all are skewed quite much more to the one side or the other, so much so, that even fandom has become toxic. (Detail on this in another article maybe)

So here it goes. First of all, objectively looking, finishing in top 2 of a world tournament is a great achievement and kudos to the Indian team for making it to World Cup 2023 Final. And, to dominate the league stage like no other, is an even bigger feat to take some pride out of. Hence, whatever the reasons, planning or alignment of the stars etc etc, the team did pretty good and the team did make us happy and proud, barring the final.

However, as heartening as that may sound, the context is important and there are some obvious observations and questions that crop up. And, unfortunately again, this is with a mindset to think what can be done differently next time. 

We have heard umpteen times and more so in the recent past that one bad match does not make a bad team. Well, as true it may be purely on the validity of an isolated statement, with the relevant context, it does not paint such a happy and proud picture.

Let’s revisit, why the ‘Chokers’ tag got stuck to SA? It is because, more often than not, they have been one of the better teams in the tournaments and yet, they have not been able to convert it into a trophy. They ‘choke’ in important matches.

Now, here is the list of ‘one bad match/es’ that India has had in the past decade.

• 2014 T20 EC Final
• 2015 ODI WC Semi Final
• 2016 T20 WC Semi Final
• 2017 Champions Trophy Final
• 2019 ODI WC Semi Final
• 2021 WTC Final
• 2022 T20 WC Semi Final
• 2023 WTC Final
• 2023 World Cup 2023 Final

That is, 9 big matches at the biggest of stages. This demands a change in thinking that “India lost just one game and this does not make them a bad team”. If time and again you cannot keep it together and convert the big day into a favorable result, well you are not a great team by any means. Let’s be objective about this and I think this does not need any debate when put like this.

If a kid always keeps failing in final exams while acing the unit tests all year, the kid is not progressing any further. That does make him a poor student and I don’t think there would be even a single person on earth who would refute that. Maybe he/she has a brilliant mind and will make a name later in life, in some other field, but as a student, the rating will be poor without any debate.

The problem is, in cricket, you do not have the option to make your name somewhere else. You need to make your name in the exact same sport in the same universe. So even if you are brilliant (by some distorted definition), if you are not winning the ultimate prize, you are not great. 

With this context, Indian team definitely is not the worst team but it has a long long way to go to be called a good team. You got to show the cups in the cabinet to be called one. It is that black and white in sports.

Should not the Indian team also be called ‘chokers’ then? Looks like hell of a choke.

From 2015 World Cup onwards, In ODI world cups, India has a W/L ratio of 6. Freaking 6. They have lost 4 and won 24 matches. But, with an absolute vacuum in the trophy cabinet.

The next best, Australia. W/L ratio of mere 3.8 (if you compare to India’s 6), winning 23 and losing 6 matches but, have 2 glistening trophies to show for it.

So, there is a problem and it needs to be talked about and needs to be thought about as to how it can be addressed rather than trivializing the issue by terming it as one bad day.

With that aside, let’s rewind about a few things that unfolded on the big day. Frankly, the match was lost even before India’s innings ended. Rest was just a formality with the possibility of a little drama. 

First the good bits of World Cup 2023 Final, as they were fewer.

• Good start by Rohit again maximizing the powerplay.
• Rohit and Virat and kept the momentum going even on the slowish pitch. It did not look like a slowish pitch till these two were batting.
• Kohli was enroute building yet another one of his masterclass innings, holding it together and also keeping the score ticking.
• Barring the first over, Bumrah and Shami really bowled their hearts out to put India back in the game. 

The bad bits, well, the list will be long here. Take a deep breath as we move ahead. Shall we? We will only talk about the major ones.

Rohit Sharma’s Dismissal

Rohit Sharma was going great guns as usual but he again did not manage to capitalize big on the start. Glenn Maxwell is a part timer and needed to be attacked especially in the powerplay which Sharma did brilliantly but then, this time around he overdid it. When you already have scored a 6 and a 4 in the over why do you want to go out and manufacture another big hit. It was understandable if something was thrown in his slot but Sharma premeditated and manufactured the shot which silenced the crowd. Big big miss in the understanding of the game situation.

Shreyas Iyer’s Dismissal

Shreyas Iyer for all his exploits cannot deny his shortcomings himself. There were always 2 major issues with his skill set. One, the tackling of short ball which he seems to have improved and his exploits in the middle overs proved valuable to India. Two, he has very poor defense skills especially if the ball is moving around. In the final he had to come a bit early, ball was moving a little bit and he got exposed. This is not to discredit his earlier exploits.
But the point is, when any player is doing well, we create a godly invincible aura around him in the commentary and in the media without even hinting at the possible areas for improvements. This aura and atmosphere around a player also affects selections so the experts need to keep it balanced and as objective as possible. And no matter how much player’s isolate themselves from social media, it does influence them. In the good phase they might also start thinking that everything is good about them and nothing needs to be worked upon. This is fatal.

Kohli, Rahul’s Partnership

The biggest blunder of the match was the death partnership between Kohli and Rahul. Yes we were under pressure at 3 down just after the first powerplay but it was not an unplayable pitch. 

It was understandable that these two consolidated till the 20th over but after the 20th over they had to make a move. They did exactly the opposite of what they had been doing in previous matches. They went so deep in their shell that only a volcano could have spat them out from the depths of the earth. We did not ever even see any intent to score from them in this period. Kohli was still better and playing as per his template. Cannot fault Kohli much here except that he should also have looked to try for boundaries in a risk free manner like he does. Here is a little breakdown.

Kohli was 23 from 20 balls when Iyer got out. His progression then went as:

31 from 30 balls

38 from 40 balls

46 from 50 balls

52 from 60 balls

54 from 63 balls.

All this without hitting a four and still ended up with an 85 SR which was good. Without taking risks he was able to take out 7,8 runs every 10 balls. But the glorious blockathon that Rahul played would have been stuff of legends even in a Test match.

KL was 4 from 10 balls

9 from 20 balls

15 from 30 balls

21 from 40 balls

23 from 50 balls

32 from 60 balls

38 from 70 balls

47 from 80 balls

55 from 90 balls

62 from 100 balls

66 from 107 balls.

The only boundary came up in the 51 to 60 runs period. 

In 40 overs, we ended up managing only 4 boundaries and two of those from Shami and Siraj. I mean no matter what you have done earlier, this is not something we can be proud of, especially in a final.

Let’s now take a look at what over was in play at different stages of Kohi and Rahul

Kohli:

0 in 5th over

10 in 7th over (2 overs from 0 to 10)

20 in 8th over (1 over from 10 to 20)

30 in 14th over (6 overs)

40 in 21st over (7 overs)

50 in 26th over (5 overs)

54 in 29th over (3 overs)

Considering Kohli still had a decent SR, it goes to show how much Rahul hogged and blocked. Kohli faced only a few balls in each of the above phases. Kohli was still well poised at 29th over to think of changing gears. It was unfortunate he got out then.

Rahul:

0 in 11th over

10 in 16th over

20 in 21st over

30 in 27th over

40 in 31st over

50 in 35th over

60 in 39th over

66 in 42nd over

The partnership lasted 109 balls with 67 runs with only one 4. I think even test matches with difficult conditions yield more boundaries.

KL played 61.5% of the balls in the partnership and Kohli 38.5%

The match was practically over by the time Rahul got out. He could have instead tried to score from 30 overs onwards or die trying because we were not going to win with anything less than 280-290. There was no point in delaying the agony and dying a slow death. At least we could have felt that we tried. Here we did not even try.

I know the players feel more than us fans but it is amazing that they keep feeling this time and again and still not changing it, when, only they can change it. 

Supporting your team is one thing but overlooking the shortcomings for a decade is something stupid. We support and that is why we glue ourselves to these matches but then, the right questions and criticisms are warranted if time and again you falter at the most important step.

We obliterate every opposition in useless bilateral matches which no one remembers and fold when it comes to big matches. As genuine fans we should not be ignoring these. We should still ask the tough questions without being toxic.

Opening Bowling Spell of World Cup 2023 Final

The way Bumrah started, it was deja vu of 2003 opening spell by Zaheer. And he had struggled in the Semi Final as well with the new ball. I do not understand that someone who was bowling with prodigious swing throughout the tournament and was brilliantly able to control the swing, all of a sudden was not able to control the swing, come the knockouts. Why do we see similar failing patterns more in important games? 

To bring in Shami to take the new ball was another contentious decision. To win with the score India had, India had to have effective bowlers all throughout and hope spin plays a part.

Shami had not taken the new ball in the whole tournament and even before that for quite some time. It would have been and was even more difficult for him to control the swing.

The idea was not all that bad considering his success against lefthanders but the move had the potential to backfire and somewhat it did. The result still would have been the same but probability reduced with Shami’s extended spell up front. 

That effectively took Siraj out of the equation fully as he was one bowler who always has been totally ineffective with an older ball. Siraj’s best chance of striking was with the newer ball. Shami and Bumrah can bowl at every stage. After getting Warner out which was a bonus, Shami should have been held back to try to penetrate after the first spell. 

Middle Overs

There is no other way to say it but India was not able to do anything worthwhile in the middle overs. The pitch got better to bat, there was no spin, there were no attacking fields, singles were easily taken and so on. Sometime during the course the spinners were able to extract an edge out of both of Marnus and Head but there was no slip to take those. It was not a score one could defend without wickets and the wicket taking fields were and pressure fields to stop singles was clearly not visible. All in all, it was a lost cause.

Final Thoughts World Cup 2023 Final

India is a good enough team to be consistently in the top 4 of major tournaments but definitely not good enough to win the trophy. Such teams are and should neve be called great. They are a good team though. If we had performed similarly in bilaterals etc we could have been happy that we reach the top 4 but everywhere else we dominate and then fold in big ones. There was only one way India was going to lose and that was if everybody failed either with the bat or the ball. And fail they did and chose the biggest of stages to do so, again.

This is not the definition of great. On the contrary, great teams are those who punch above. When we used to be underdogs, we did get happy about reaching semis and finals and the losses did not sting that much. The pride quotient of Afghanistan fans would be higher than Indian fans.

Lets hope the management learns from here and takes steps to make the Indian team a great one. Not sure from where and how but still hoping to see a cup soon.