Chennai: Not really concerned about the 26-run defeat at the hands of India in the series opener, Australia skipper Steve Smith has vowed to hit back in the second ODI at Kolkata on Thursday.
“The first game in a five-match series is always a nice one to win, but we still have four games left in the series,” said Smith.
Coming into the Chepauk match, the focus was on India’s wrist spinners Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal and the spin duo did play a role by taking five wickets between them. Smith, however, said facing wrist spin is not the only focus for the Aussies. “India have some quality seamers as well. We haven’t been focusing on spin alone; I can assure you that,” he added.
After a splendid start, Australia shot themselves in the foot as they let India off the hook. Skipper Smith himself spilled a couple of catches. “You always want to take your catches. I obviously dropped one early (Rohit Sharma) and one that sort of yorked me as well (Hardik Pandya’s). I couldn’t get my hands underneath it. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to capitalise on what was a very good start,” he added.
As the rain curtailed the chase to a 21-over lottery, Australia were saddled with the tricky issue of facing two new balls.
“It was never going to be easy chasing 160 with two new balls. It was a sort of good wicket to bowl with new ball. We took three wickets with the new ball and India found it quite hard. It was the same for us. We could have perhaps played a little bit differently,” he added.
