This was published 2 years ago
That’s all we have for you tonight as Australia continue their celebrations following their World Test Championship win over India.
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Please join us for the first Test of the Ashes series from England starting on Friday.
Bye for now.
Australian spinner Nathan Lyon finished with 4-41 taking all of his wickets on the final day.
Scott Boland changed the final day with two wickets in the one over. He finished with 2-46 from 16 overs.
Australia have won the World Test Championship in emphatic style at the Oval.
Here’s how we rated each member of the winning team.
Not for the first time in the past two years, Head’s punishing century set Australia up to drive the outcome of the game. By no means a stylist, Head’s powerful shot making and fierce resolve to choose the aggressive option was richly demonstrated by his fast scoring after arriving with the score an uncertain 3-76. A skittish second innings ended with an unsightly caught and bowled, but when the rewards are so great on the days he succeeds, Head’s occasional blemishes are more than acceptable.
Momentarily there were nerves. Virat Kohli and Ajinkya Rahane were finding the middle of the bat, the ball seemed not to be doing much, and Marnus Labuschagne coaxed a speculative caught behind review from captain Pat Cummins.
In the recent past, that may have been the start of an Australian panic and perhaps even an Indian miracle. Instead, Scott Boland found the perfect tempter for Kohli, Steve Smith clasped a terrific catch, and Cummins found himself accepting the World Championship trophy little more than an hour later after Australia triumphed by 209 runs over India at the Oval.
It was altogether fitting that Australia sealed the formal title as world’s best Test team by putting together a clinical day-five display at the Oval to close out a match they had dominated throughout with a combination of sweat and flair.
Scott Boland has dragged himself ever closer to an Ashes berth with a strong performance during Australia’s emphatic World Test Championship final victory over England at the Oval on Sunday.
It was just the second WTC final played and the first contested by Australia, but India have now played in and lost both, this time by 209 runs. Australia dominated the match from the opening day after being sent in by Indian captain Rohit Sharma.
Steve Smith claimed this victory had been the aim of the team since the current cycle began two years ago.
“We can’t celebrate as hard as we would like to with a game not too far away, but we have to be proud of our achievements for sure,” he said.
Australian skipper Pat Cummins spoke during the presentations.
On Head:
“He’s been brilliant throughout this whole campaign, he just puts pressure right back on the bowlers,” Cummins said.
“We left day one feeling like we were on top of this game because of those guys [Head and Smith].”
Indian captain Rohit Sharma on the match.
“I thought we started well in putting them into bat, we bowled well in the first session then let ourselves down a little bit but you have to give credit to Travis Head and Steve Smith,” Sharma said during the presentations.
“Congratulations to Australia.”
On Rahane:
“We needed somebody to stand up and Rahane and Shardul Thakur made a good partnership.
Travis Head has been named the official man of the match as well.
His 163 runs changed the match and swung it in Australia’s favour.