Sydney:Ā Australia’s leg-spin duo Mitchell Swepson and Adam Zampa shared four wickets and gave away just 44 runs in seven overs to help Australia win the third T20 International against India by 12 runs as consolation on Tuesday.
Virat Kohli, India captain, said, ‘At one stage when Hardik started going we thought we could pull it off. The middle over phase during our batting cost us the game. A partnership of 30-odd would’ve made it easier for Hardik. We are finding ways to come back and give the opposition a scare and the series win is a little asterisk for us to finish the 2020 season on a high. I feel the crowd was a factor as well, it’s always giving you a dimension of motivation. Our crowd pulls us through sometimes, and Australia’s too, and we as players feed off the crowd’s energy. We need to take the same competitive attitude into the Tests, and having played here a few times, we can score runs as well. Once it’s time to capitalize and score, we need to do that session by session. I’m sure the current side is stronger than last time (Test matches) and I’ll see if I can play the tour match.’
Aaron Finch, Australia captain, said, ‘It was a great series, and we just happened to be on the wrong end of the first two. It’s the first time we’ve had two leg-spinners in the side, and they were bold with the short boundaries here, so credit to both of them. Swepson bowled the 7th over against Shikhar and Virat, both destructive in their own ways, but Zamps bowled really well as well. We played some great white-ball cricket over the last 18 months and really proud of the bunch.’
Hardik Pandya, Man of the Series, said, ‘I’m very pleased, and wouldn’t mind getting the Man of the Series award, but it was a team effort. After the 2nd ODI we thought we’d think of this this a 4-match series and we managed to get three wins, so happy with that. I don’t mind giving interviews because you only have those when you’re on the winning side. I haven’t seen my child for four months, so I’d like to spend some time with family right now.’