Australia’s Big Show Maxwell is flopping nowadays. India are alive in this T20I series by registering a victory in a match shortened due to wet ground in Nagpur . Now both the teams will travel to Hyderabad for the deciding match where the final match of the series will be played on Sunday.
Rohit Sharma will have a chance to win a ninth consecutive series as captain while Australia are on the verge of becoming the first team to beat India for the second time at home. Both the teams have a good chance to do something but for this the Hyderabad weather will have to be kind to them. Let us take a look at the important stats related to this do or die match.
Akshar set out on his way to become the main spinner
Axar Patel included in XI after Ravindra Jadeja’s injuryProving his usefulness, he is slowly becoming the leading spinner of the Indian T20 International team. He has bowled economical in this series, mainly hunting in the powerplays. His specialty is that he can bowl any time in an innings and his international career economy is only 7.1. With his round the wicket angle, he troubles the right handed batsmen a lot.
In his Indian career against right-handed batsmen, Akshar has spent 21 wickets at an economy of 6.2. There is no other left-handed batsman in the Australian team other than Matthew Wade and in such a situation, Bapu has a good opportunity to increase his wickets. Bowling stump-to-stump, Axar has taken four out of five wickets in this series as bowled.
Big Show became a flop show?
T20 cricket superstar Glenn Maxwell is known for his aggressive batting in leagues around the world. However, his performance in T20 International cricket has gone downhill since 2020. Where he averaged below 20 with the bat in the last two years, this year he has been scoring runs at an average of 21.8. Not only this, he has a strike rate of 129 which is his lowest strike rate in any one year since 2013. Since 2020, Maxwell has batted in 27 innings and has crossed the 20-run mark only eight times.
The worrying thing is that on 14 occasions he has not even reached double digits. Maxwell, who has made his mark as a spin hitter, has struggled against spin and has been out against spin 13 times in the last three years. If this continues, Australia will find it difficult to defend the T20 World Cup.
Kohli becomes the king in the deciding match
This year has been good for Virat Kohli despite scoring low scores in two matches of this series . In T20 Internationals this year, Kohli has scored 370 runs at a strike rate of 141 with the help of three half-centuries and one century. Kohli, who scored 731 runs in 20 innings against Australia, loves to score runs in the third and deciding match of the series.
In the six deciding matches of the series, Kohli has scored 289 runs at an average of 89.7 and a strike rate of 167. Not only this, he has scored an unbeaten half-century with the bat in the last three decisive matches and he would like to continue the series in Hyderabad.