Bengaluru, Nov 13: India on Sunday scripted history by becoming the first team to go undefeated in the round-robin format, winning all nine games after they beat Netherlands by mammoth 160 runs, here.Previously, Sri Lanka (1996) and Australia (2003) came close to as many as eight wins.
After a convincing win in the Asia Cup lifting the trophy, Indian dominance continued in the World Cup as well as they started the campaign with a thumping victory over mighty Australia.
India will now face New Zealand on Wednesday in the semifinals in Pune.
The Blackcaps struggle for semis quakification was threatened by Afghanistan and Pakistan as they lost four games in a row following an unbeaten start, but the 2015 and 2019 finalists held firm, defeating Sri Lanka in their final league match to join India, South Africa, and Australia in the knockouts.
Only two teams have won the Cricket World Cup after staying undefeated throughout the tournament. The West Indies did it in 1975 and 1979, while Australia did it in 2003 and 2007.
Rohit Sharma, skipper, said:Ā Since we started the tournament, for us, it was all about thinking about one game at a time and playing that game well. We never wanted to look too far ahead because it’s a long tournament. It was important for us to break it down and focus on one game and play that well. That is what everyone did. Because you play in different venues and different conditions, you got to adapt and play accordingly, that’s exactly what we did. Very pleased with how we have played in these nine games. Very clinical from game one till today. That’s because different individuals have stepped up at different times. This is a good sign for the team when everyone wants to take the responsibility and get the job done for the team. Although we play a lot of cricket in India, we know the conditions, but still when you play different opposition, that’s the challenge in different conditions. We adapted really well. We started the tournament four games in a row chased and then we had to bat first, put the runs on the board, then seamers did the rest along with the spinners. It’s important, the results do matter to keep the dressing room environment lively. There’s going to be a lot of expectations, we wanted to keep everything aside and focus on the job at hand. That is something everyone bought into. We enjoyed the company of each other once the tournament started. We wanted to play the game on the field with a lot of fun, excitement and that reflected on our performances. When we try and do these kind of things, we keep the atmosphere nice and healthy outside, guys tend to perform really well without any burden. When you have five bowlers, you want to create those options within the team. Today we had nine (bowling) options, it’s important, this was the game where we could have tried certain things. The seamers bowling those wide yorkers when it was not needed, but we wanted to do that. As a bowling unit, we wanted to try doing something different and see what we can achieve.