WC streak continued 15 years ago today Game three in Australias stunning fightback at the 1999 World Cup saw Steve Waughs men take on the might of India, whose batting order had set the tournament alight. Yet Mark Waugh and Glenn McGrath ensured it was the Australians who would carry the momentum into their next Super Six match, as Andrew Ramsey reports Having snuck through to the second stage of the 1999 World Cup accompanied by patchy performances and no carry-over points, Steve Waugh’s Australians had no discernible reason to enter their first Super Six match with much approaching confidence. Even though they had at last managed consecutive victories, the reality of overpowering a sub-standard Bangladesh and a West Indies already bearing a faded resemblance to glories past meant little given their next opponent boasted the tournament’s most feared batting line-up. Quick single: McGrath sinks Windies While India had – rather like Australia – struggled to get going in England’s biting spring chill that pervaded the tournament’s early weeks and had suffered defeats to South Africa and Zimbabwe in their first two outings, they had struck ominously good form come the Super Six phase. Their top three batsmen – Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid (twice) – had struck centuries, a feat managed by no other team’s batsmen at that stage of the tournament. Which only served to underscore the dominance of ball over bat in the group matches played mostly under low, grey skies on pitches that offered swing and seam movement, especially when the rock-hard Duke balls were in pristine shape. But following their spluttering start that had taken them from the English Midlands, to Wales and then the north, the Australians welcomed a 10-day stint in familiar London surrounds knowing their impending Super Six encounters with India and Zimbabwe could set them up for an unlikely shot at the title. Unlikely, due to the fact the ICC’s newly introduced Super Six concept enabled the top three teams from both qualifying groups to progress, but in doing so they took with them the points they had scored over other ‘Sixers’. Australia’s earlier losses to fellow qualifiers Pakistan and New Zealand meant they arrived at The Oval for the tournament’s first Super Six hit-out knowing they held no points and consequently their only hope to remain alive was to simply keep winning. Seven matches from seven, as Steve Waugh had bluntly outlined after the loss to Pakistan at Headingley. The fact that India were in the same position, with South Africa and Zimbabwe qualifying from their group, meant the loser at The Oval could virtually abandon any hope of reaching the semi-finals or beyond. So when they were sent into bat, the Australians knew that much less than 300 would leave them vulnerable unless their bowlers could suddenly find the form that only Glenn McGrath had hinted at in the previous win against the West Indies. Mark Waugh, whose 67 in the opening match against Scotland remained the highest score by an Australian in the qualifying stages, set about posting a new benchmark and his 83 provided a springboard from which his team occasionally wobbled but eventually launched. India’s victory target of 283 might never have been previously achieved in a 50- over international played on English soil, but with the calibre of their batting it was going to take a special bowling effort to keep that record intact. Enter McGrath, who in the space of 20 legitimate deliveries announced his match-turning effort against the West Indies was but a warm-up, and effectively decided India’s fate before many of their enthusiastic fans had resumed their seats following the lunch break. His immaculate length and subtle seam movement accounted for Tendulkar in the opening over, thereby removing for a duck the master who had peeled off sublime centuries in each of his previous three matches against Australia. McGrath then took care of Dravid in similar fashion, smartly caught behind by Adam Gilchrist, and after Damien Fleming dislodged Ganguly’s leg bail via an inside edge, McGrath fixed up Indian skipper Mohammad Azharuddin to leave the Bob Simpson coached batting giants 4-17 and all-but-dead in the water. While it was but number three of the seven consecutive wins Waugh had identified, the 77-run margin was by far the most convincing and meritorious of their month in England and suddenly there was a buoyancy about a team that barely a week earlier had been riven by self-interest and self-doubt.
Posted on: Wed, 04 Jun 2014 07:29:28 +0000
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