Aussies look to put India under early pressure

LONDON: Two of the World Cup favourites will clash in what is one of the biggest games of the ICC World Cup here at The Oval on Sunday (today).

Defending champions Australia and 2011 winners India will both look for supremacy with Aussie captain Aaron Finch announcing that his bowlers will target o get the dangerous Indian duo of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma early.

Sharma and Kohli both average over 50 against Australia in ODI cricket but Finch is hoping that his team will produce the sort of performance that helped them come back from two games down to win the recent One-day International series in India.

“Having played India so much recently, we sometimes let Virat get off to a bit of a flier and let them get off the hook early,” Finch told reporters here at The Oval on Saturday.

“Once he gets into a rhythm he’s so hard to stop and you can’t afford to play catch up against great players and Rohit is the same.

“He’s so destructive when he starts to really put the pressure on you. You can’t afford to give them too much freedom but we can’t focus on just two players either, look at the rest of their batting line up.

“Those first ten or 15 balls it’s about making them take a risk and early wickets will be a real key.

“Winning those last three games in India gave us some self-belief we can beat this side in their home conditions and that gives us real confidence coming into a game like this.

“It comes down to seizing the key moments. You have to believe you can beat them, because they are a world-class side with some all-time great players.”

Australia believe that they will ready for Indian pacer Jasprit Bumrah, regarded as the most destructive bowler in the tournament.

“We’ve done our due diligence on every bowler but Bumrah’s obviously world class and he’s had a lot of success in the last 18 months,” added Finch. “All the guys are as well prepared mentally and tactically as they can be face everything we expect from them, they’ll be no surprises.

“We need to stick to what worked at back end of that series in India. You’ve got to be confident and if you aren’t committed 100 percent against a side like India they will punish you.

“It’s not just about pace bowling, both sides have had some success with their spinners in the past couple of months. What it comes down to is execution, especially on a pretty good Oval wicket.

“We thought we were well prepared for what the West Indies threw at us but sometimes it’s harder to play when you know what’s coming. We just didn’t commit to our plans for long enough that’s a lesson we need to learn,” he said.