Follow UsAustralia succumbed to a four-wicket loss in the ICC Champions Trophy 2025 semi-final clash against India in Dubai on March 4 (Tuesday). Chasing 265, India looked comfortable throughout and got him with 11 balls to spare.
India have played all their matches of the Champions Trophy in Dubai and will also play the final at the same venue. The other seven teams ave had to play at different venues across Pakistan and as a result, they could not acclimatise the way India have to a particular venue.
Many, including South Africa batter Rassie van der Dussen, have spoken against this preference given to India. Australia captain Steve Smith though, refused to get sucked into such a discussion.
"I'm not buying into it. I think it is what it is. India obviously played some really good cricket here. The surface kind of suits their style with the spinners that they've got and the seamers that they have at their disposal for a wicket like that. They played well, they outplayed us and they deserve the victory," Smith said at the post-match press conference.
Smith, however, conceded that the wickets in Lahore are far better than Dubai. "The wickets we played on, yeah, they're completely different tracks. This one's quite slow, two-paced, took some spin. I think the Gaddafi track is arguably one of the best one-day wickets in the world for batting,? Smith said.
"The ball skids on nicely, the outfield's lightning, and yeah, there's definite differences there."
Speaking of the semi-final clash against India, Smith reckons a total of about 300 would have been ideal. "I think we had our opportunities throughout to post something up above 300," Smith, who top-scored for Australia with 73, said.
"We were probably just that one wicket down too many at a few stages throughout the innings. If we extended one of those partnerships a little bit we're probably getting up 290-300 and we're putting a bit of pressure on the scoreboard.
"So, it's clearly not the easiest wicket to bat on. The square block as a whole I think has seen a lot of cricket over the last couple of months. We can see it's pretty tired and that's probably the reason why we haven't seen a score above 300 in the tournament here so far so we did a reasonable job but we probably just lacked a couple of those partnerships just dragging out a little bit further to get us up somewhere near 300 or just above."
While Australia crash out of the tournament, India will play the final against South Africa or New Zealand on March 9 (Sunday).