Australia wicketkeeper Alex Carey acknowledged the value of Virat Kohli’s match-winning knock — an unbeaten half-century — in the third Twenty20 International in Sydney on Sunday .
“He obviously played really well tonight. He was put under a little bit of pressure towards the end but they started well in the PowerPlay and it was hard to peg them back. We’ve seen him do that before and he did it again tonight. Hopefully in Tests, it will be a different story — we’ve got some good pacer bowlers and Nathan Lyon. It will be a really good summer of cricket ahead,” Carey said.
‘Competitive target’
Carey termed the target of 165 set by his side as “competitive.”
“It was a competitive target; probably, like Virat said, 180 [would have been better]. They like chasing. They chased that really well. There were some really positive signs. We don’t like losing. There was an opportunity there. We got close but a really good side got them tonight,” he said.
‘Real impact’
For the contest, Australia had brought back fast bowler Mitchell Starc. Starc impressed by dismissing Shikhar Dhawan and slowing the scoring rate. Praising Starc’s bowling, Carey said, “I thought he bowled really well tonight. Shikhar Dhawan obviously got him away for a couple of fours and that happens in T20 cricket but I thought he came into the side and he was really excited to play this game. He hasn’t played too many T20 games. I thought he had a real impact. He has played a lot of cricket now. He’s a real professional, looks after his body, come off a Shield game and into a T20 game now. I’m just as excited as you guys to watch him take on India along with Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins and obviously Lyon. He’ll be fine.”
T20 cricket ‘strong’
The defeat ensured a 1-1 drawn Twenty20 series; Australia will have to wait longer for a major Twenty20 series win since February, when it had defeated New Zealand and England in a tri-nation series. Carey said, “We’re ranked third and have scored a 1-1 series against India. We would have really loved to take the series tonight and win that one. Our T20 format and Big Bash is really conducive of getting some players out of that and T20 cricket in Australia is strong. We’ve got guys that go around the world and are some of the biggest names in T20 cricket.”
A few more runs on the board could have made the contest tighter, he felt. “We would have loved to put 15 more runs on the board tonight and I guess — who knows — in Melbourne as well. It was quite a difficult wicket in overcast conditions and could have gone either way. I think we’re playing some really good T20 cricket and cricket in general. I think there were some really great signs in the one-day stuff,” Carey said.
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