The current Australian team looks not a shadow of the team that ruled the world and won the World Cup five times
In squash during the legend Jahangir Khan’s era it was not news that Jahangir Khan had won British Open or World Open. But when after record 555 consecutive wins he lost to New Zealand’s Ross Norman in World Open in 1986, it was a front-page story.
The same is the case in cricket with Australia. If they whitewash a team it’s not news, but if they are whitewashed it’s shocking, to say the least.
South Africa became the first team to whitewash Australia 5-0 in their recent series. South Africa beat Australia 4-1 in a series in Australia in 2009.
Before the Australia series, South Africa had recorded clean sweeps in five or more match ODI series four times, three times against West Indies.
The Aussies had never lost a five-match series to nil. Australia’s last ODI whitewash was a 4-0 loss in a five-match series to England in 2012. The last time they lost all the matches played in an ODI series was in 2006-07 when New Zealand beat them by 3-0.
As a captain it was the ninth defeat for skipper Steve Smith in last 11 ODIs. The current Australian team looks not a shadow of the team that ruled the world and won the World Cup five times.
In the absence of South African ODI skipper AB de Villiers, it was a great achievement. The hosts dominated in every department of the game. Two of the wins came with more than 10 overs to spare and one was won by 140 runs.
The major lacking for Australia was toothless bowling. Australia didn’t bowl out South Africa even once in the series. In the third match, at Durban, Australia’s inexperienced attack was unable to defend a huge total of 371 and lost the game by four wickets.
David Miller along with young AL Phehlukwayo scored 107 runs in just 12 overs for the seventh-wicket unbroken partnership and won the match.
Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood were not picked for South Africa to allow them time to refresh for the home series against South Africa.
Starc was Australia’s leading wicket-taker in 2015 with 59 wickets in 19 international matches. Starc also holds the record of completing 100 ODI wickets in his 52nd match. He surpassed Pakistan’s Saqlain Mushtaq’s record of 100 wickets in 53 ODIs. During his 100 wickets he got four wickets 11 times, more than any other bowler.
Overworked Hazlewood bowled 509.4 overs in the past year. That was why the selectors rested him.
The batsmen were also disappointing. They crossed 300 just once and were bowled out in three matches. Five of the top six scorers were South Africans.
But opener David Warner remained the most successful batsman of the series with 386 runs, at an average of 77.20. He hit two centuries and one fifty.
Warner surpassed Geoff Marsh’s 349 runs against West Indies in 1990-91. Warner has scored five ODI hundreds in his 1,089 runs this year from 20 matches at an average of 57.31.
Rilee Rossouw scored 311 runs with one hundred and two half-centuries, averaging 77.75.
AL Phehlukwayo was the most successful bowler in his first international series with eight wickets. Tremain took seven wickets for Australia, at an average of 36.42.