Cricket’s final frontier

Cricketing reputations are sometimes made or shattered based on how a player performs against Australia. That’s been something of a trend ever since the West Indies began its free fall after losing to Australia in the mid-1990s. And Australia, in its own backyard, is considered the ultimate opposition. Sachin Tendulkar has scored 100 international centuries, but even today his splendid 114 at Perth during the 1992 tour of Australia is regarded as one of his finest. For Virat Kohli’s men, who have just set foot in Australia and narrowly lost their first Twenty20 encounter, the long tour presents an opportunity for India to reiterate its credentials. The International Cricket Council has ranked India as number one in Tests and placed it at the second spot in both ODIs and Twenty20 Internationals. Incidentally, in all three lists, Kohli’s men are ranked above Australia. The hosts remain a powerful force at home, but having been weakened by the ban-induced absence of Steve Smith and David Warner following the ball-tampering incident earlier this year in South Africa, they are shorn of their usual domineering aura. Australia is placed fifth, sixth and fourth in Tests, ODIs and Twenty20s, respectively. The dip in performance has been matched by intense self-analysis about the manner in which Australia plays its sport. The ‘result-justifies-the-unsavoury-methods’ philosophy has been put through a wringer ever since Cameron Bancroft was caught rubbing a sandpaper on the ball.

Source : https://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-opinion/crickets-final-frontier/article25572203.ece

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