The fifth and final ODI between India and Australia was played with the series on the line and India’s record at home with it too was at stake. Team India last lost an ODI series at home against South Africa in 2015.
Aaron Finch won the toss and chose to bat first. Australia brought in Marcus Stoinis for Shaun Marsh and Nathan Lyon came in for Jason Behrendorff. India, meanwhile, brought in Ravindra Jadeja for KL Rahul and Mohammad Shami came in place of Yuzvendra Chahal.
Australia has a strong opening partnership of 78 with Finch making 27 before Jadeja bowled him. Then Usman Khawaja and Peter Handscomb added 99 runs for the second wicket, with Khawaja bringing up the second ODI century of his career and this series. He departed soon after, caught by Kohli off Bhuvneshwar for 100 in 106 balls with 2 sixes and 10 fours.
Handscomb made 52 and became the victim of Shami. After these wickets, Indian bowlers pulled back the rate of scoring drastically, as Maxwell fell for 1 to Jadeja and Stoinis and Turner both fell for 20 runs apiece. Alex Carey departed for 3 leaving Australia 229/7 in the 46th over.
Australia finished with 272/9 with Ravindra Jadeja picking 2/45, Bhuvneshwar getting 3/48 and Shami returning figures of 2/57. Kuldeep had an off day with figures of 1/74.
Team India needed a strong opening start and though Dhawan and Rohit started confidently, Cummins had Dhawan caught by Carey for 12. Virat (20) then had a small partnership with Rohit adding 53 runs. But then Stoinis removed Kohli and Pant, who came in at no.4 and made 16 was dismissed by Lyon. Vijay Shankar was looking good but perished trying to hit a six too many off Zampa.
The last hope for a revival went with Rohit Sharma, who during his innings of 56 completed 8,000 runs in ODIs, but was dismissed by Zampa, stumped by Carey in a moment of madness, leaving Indian team 132/5. Kedar Jadhav (44) and Bhuvneshwar Kumar (46 with 3 fours and 2 sixes) lifted the hopes a bit with a partnership of 91 runs for the 7th wicket.
But both fell back to back and Australia won the match by 35 runs and came back from a 0-2 deficit to win the series 3-2. Adam Zampa picked 3/46, Jhye Richardson picked 2/48 and Pat Cummins picked 2/38 to help Australia win the fifth ODI.
This was Indian team’s first ODI series loss since losing 2-3 to South Africa in 2015 and not a good omen heading into the ICC World Cup 2019.
BRIEF SCORES:
AUS 272/9 (U KHAWAJA 100; B KUMAR 3/48) defeated IND 237 (R SHARMA 56; A ZAMPA 3/46) by 35 runs
Australia won the ODI series 3-2.
