November 19th 2023 was supposed to be the day of the Great Indian Celebration; it was the final match in the cricket World Cup.
Preparation for this great celebration had started many years back. In 2021, the Narendra Modi Stadium was inaugurated in Ahmedabad, India. The stadium is the biggest in the world today with a seating capacity of 132,000 people, and the World Cup 2023 cricket final match was held there. The World Cup itself happens once in four years and is considered to be the greatest prize in cricket.
The 2023 World Cup started in October and concluded on November 19th. There were 10 teams in all, and every team played against every other team. The top four teams qualified into the semi-final stage. India won against New Zealand in the semi-finals, and Australia won against South Africa. Finally, on November 19th, India and Australia fought it out in the finals.
High expectations
It was not just the stadium that India built for the celebration, but over the past four years, India had also prepared a very good team under Captain Rohit Sharma. The team showed its skills and raised the hopes of a billion people throughout the tournament. They convincingly beat all of their opponents, including Australia, in the pre-knockout stage. Australia, on the other hand, lost their first two matches against India and South Africa, but they won the next eight matches.
On paper, India was the better team with star players like Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, and a whole bunch of talented younger players. To see them perform and win the cup for the 3rd time, everyone gathered in Ahmedabad. The stadium itself was packed with 130,000 people. The attendees included Indian Prime Minister Modi, stars like Shah Rukh Khan, Ranveer Singh, Deepika Padukone and more.
Reining Champions
However, Australia had other plans; they restricted India to a total of 240 runs. Then they, with relative ease, scored 241 runs in 43 overs. One of the turning points of the match was when the Indian captain Rohit Sharma lofted a ball, and Travis Head took a spectacular catch running backwards. This could be compared to Kapil Dev’s catch of Vivian Richard in the 1983 World Cup. A similar run and a similar grit was shown by Travis here. Furthermore, when Travis came to bat for Australia, he basically destroyed the Indian dream and the celebration. He scored 137 runs and won the World Cup for Australia.
When you look back and analyze how Australia won the game, even when India had an equal or better team than Australia, it comes down to one factor. Australia came into this game with a plan and a do-or-die attitude to win. That attitude was very evident in how they were fielding and restricting runs and taking catches etc. India, on the other hand, did not show that killer attitude.
That is what differentiates a good team and a champion.
This is Australia’s 6th world cup title and a very well deserved one that was pulled off by the Australian captain Pat Cummins and his team. No other country has won the world cup 6 times.