Plight of Champions

This is normally reserved for my Sporting Blog. But, having watched the performance of the Australians today in the 3rd ODI at Hamilton, i am left wondering wether this is indeed the Australia that we saw in November or is this the team that all teams wanted for the past decade or so!!!!

Australia's loss today was the 5th straight loss and their 6th from 7 matches. Even more worrying for the Australians is that the last two matches have been lost in trying to defend huge totals. In the last one dayer, they lost in trying to defend 337, and in todays match they lost trying to defend 347. The Australians may perhaps get the tag of the worst defenders in modern day cricket. They lost to South Africa in March, and that time they could not even defend 434!!!!! This time, with the world cup approaching in March, the confidence of the Aussies is sure to be dented. This might bode well for the game, because it leaves the World Cup absolutely wide open.

In my previous posts somewhere in January, i had said that the Australian team is the best team on the planet. I will still maintain the fact that the Aussies are the best team still out there, but now they are beginning to assume a more Mortal form. This month has been absolutely bad for them, winning just 1 out of 7 matches. But, it is suicide to assume that the Australians can be destroyed. In the 1999 World Cup, Australia were down and out, but they fought hard and ultimately came back to win the cup. The Australians are still the favourites, but not the red hot favourites.