Aakash Chopra gives his opinion on asking Mohammed Shami to bowl with new ball in World Cup final 2023

India lost the match against Australia in the final of the ODI World Cup 2023. The match saw many tragic moments from India, who failed to live up to the expectations of the fans for the way they had played in the tournament. There were some positives and many negatives takeaways from the tournament played by India. In the end, it came up to the middle overs play between the two sides.

With the bat, Australia got a good partnership between Travis Head and Marnus Labuschagne in the middle overs, which took the game away from India. Chasing 241, the duo achieved a 193-run stand for three wickets. With the ball, Pat Cummins and Co. bowled excellently in the middle overs and gave just two boundaries as a fielding unit in between the overs 11-40.

It created huge pressure on India and took away the game from them. One of the interesting aspects of the game was that India gave the new ball to Mohammed Shami, who bowled in the entire tournament as a first change bowler. The change in role was visible in the way Shami operated with the new ball. The Indian seamer could not control his swing early in the innings.

‘Shami did pick a wicket, but Siraj got marginalized’ – Aakash Chopra

Speaking about the choice of the Indian captain, Rohit Sharma, Chopra felt that it was not ideal to get Shami to attack with the new ball. Chopra added that Shami was wayward with his lines and could not control the swing early in the innings. Aakash acknowledged the fact that Shami got the new ball, as the target on the board was very less. Meanwhile, Aakash felt that Mohammad Siraj was marginalized.

Shami and Bumrah were preferred over him with the new ball. Even with the old ball, Jadeja and Kuldeep bowled before Siraj. “We went with Shami instead of Siraj because we didn’t have runs on the board. When we did that, Shami did pick up a wicket, but Siraj got marginalized. He didn’t get a chance at all. His game was almost over because you couldn’t bring him in,” added Chopra.