After chasing down a mark of 265 with 11 deliveries remaining, Team India defeated Australia by 4 wickets on Tuesday at the Dubai International Stadium to guarantee their spot in the ICC Champions Trophy 2025 final.
The men in blue sped to the finish line in 48.1 overs to become the first team into the tournament’s summit match, led by Virat Kohli’s outstanding 84-run knock off 98 deliveries.
After Australia won the toss and chose to bat first, Mohammed Shami gave India a strong start by dismissing Cooper Connoly for a duck at nine balls. Travis Head also had some trouble, but he hit a 39 off of 33 balls. On his second ball, Varun Chakaravarthy got him out, causing India to relive some unpleasant memories.
Jadeja trapped the latter in front in the 23rd over after Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne put up a 56-run partnership to rebuild. After just a few balls, he dismissed Josh Inglis, reducing Australia to 144/4. In the 38th over, Shami dismissed Smith after he and Carey had stood for half a century.Glenn Maxwell was removed by Axar Patel in the following over. Carey’s outstanding half-century stood out as wickets continued to fall on the opposing side. In the 48th over, Shreyas Iyer was run out due to a bullet direct hit, which significantly altered the final total.
Pandya took the tenth wicket on the third delivery of the 50th over, limiting Smith and company to 264 despite some effort from the tailenders.
Before the chase was settled for the men in blue by Shreyas Iyer and Kohli, India lost their openers Rohit Sharma and Shubman Gill in the first eight overs of the match. Before succumbing to Adam Zampa, Shreyas contributed 45 runs to the score.As the pressure increased, Kohli was also dismissed by Zampa before the game was over, but Hardik Pandya and KL Rahul consistently hit boundaries to set up Jadeja for the game-winning stroke that guaranteed the team’s spot in the final!
