More than a billion hearts broke on Sunday as Australia defeated India by 6 wickets at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad to win the ICC ODI World Cup title for the sixth time in history.
India were undefeated in the tournament with 10 wins on the bounce and were favourites to stretch that run to 11 and lift the coveted trophy but it was not to be as the only match they made errors happened to be the final.
Chasing a below-par score of 241 for victory, Australia rode on 137 from opener Travis Head and an unbeaten 58 from Marnus Labuschagne to reach the target in 43 overs to silence the 1.3 lakh spectators present in the venue, just like Pat Cummins had said before the final.
Head & Labuschagne finish Indian challenge
Head got great support from Labuschagne at the other end as the duo stitched a192-run partnership for the fourth wicket to take Australia to victory in their 8th World Cup final.
Fast bowlers Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Shami tried their best to bring India back into the game with their fiery first spells in which they removed David Warner, Mitchell Marsh and Steven Smith in quick succession to reduce Australia to 47 for 3 in the powerplay.
But Head and Labuschagne ensured there were no more blemishes as the pitch eased out for batting and the duo made merry on it.
Bumrah bagged a couple of scalps while Shami took one but the rest went wicketless which ended all hopes of an Indian victory after a disappointing batting performance in the first half.
Masterstroke from Cummins to bowl first
Australian skipper Pat Cummins surprised majority of the cricketing fraternity by opting to bowl first earlier in the day but his decision proved to be a masterstroke as the slow surface didn't allow the Indian batters to score freely but became a belter of a track after sunset and under the lights.
Captain Rohit Sharma was the only other batter apart from Head who looked comfortable in the middle when he opened for India, scoring a quickfire 47 off 31 balls.
Failure to launch
But the rest of the batters in the Indian lineup struggled to keep up the tempo which eventually led to India's downfall. Virat Kohli and KL Rahul's 67-run partnership looked promising but once that was broken by Cummins, it all went downhill from India.
Rahul top-scored with 66 while Kohli made 54 but the lack of contributions from the others made it nearly impossible for India to post a winning total and they got bowled out for 240 in 50 overs.
Starc was the pick of the bowlers for the Aussies with 3 wickets while Cummins and Hazlewood took two each. Spinners Adam Zampa and Glenn Maxwell contributed with a wicket each.
