India milk ‘home’ advantage lifting trophy, Rohit hails spinners

India's Champions Trophy title win on Sunday confirmed their status as the world's premier white-ball side even though their latest achievement could well be branded with an asterisk.

Captain Rohit Sharma led by example as reigning Twenty20 World Champions India prevailed in a nerve-racking final against New Zealand to claim their second successive global title.

Their four-wicket victory was a perfect culmination of their unbeaten run in the 50-overs tournament featuring the world's top eight teams.

India now have an incredible record of winning 22 of their last 23 completed matches in International Cricket Council (ICC) tournaments.

Their lone defeat in the last three ICC events came in the final of the 50-overs World Cup against Australia in 2023.

Sunday's triumph will alleviate some of that pain but questions abounded about the “unfair advantage” Rohit Sharma and his men got by playing all their matches in Dubai.

India stuck to their stand of not touring host nation Pakistan because of the political bickering between the neighbours, who play each other only in global events.

While other teams shuttled between three venues in Pakistan and flew to United Arab Emirates for any match against India, the eventual winners stayed put in Dubai where conditions also favoured their traditional strength of spin bowling.

India persisted with a four-pronged spin attack in the knockout matches. Their spin quartet of Varun Chakravarthy, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel and Ravindra Jadeja bowled a combined 38 overs conceding only 144 runs and sharing five wickets among themselves.

Rohit paid tribute to his spinners and also thanked the legions of Indian fans at the heaving Dubai International Cricket Stadium on Sunday.

“The crowd has been magnificent. It's not our home ground but they've made it our home ground,” Rohit, who was player-of-the-match for his rapid 76, said.

New Zealand have been India's bugbear in ICC events and beating them twice in the tournament will be particularly pleasing for the eventual winners.

The Black Caps produced a lion-hearted bowling effort defending a modest 251-7 and captain Mitchell Santner will take heart from their gallant display in their first ICC event under the spinner's leadership.

New Zealand won a tri-series in Pakistan in their build-up and lost only to India in their spirited Champions Trophy campaign.

A shoulder injury to Matt Henry in the semifinal against South Africa robbed them of the service of their pace spearhead but New Zealand fought tooth and nail against India.

All-rounder Rachin Ravindra was adjudged player of the tournament for being the tournament's leading scorer while also sharing the spin workload and claiming three wickets.

The 25-year-old struck two hundreds that followed three centuries in the 2023 ODI World Cup.

“We've seen how he steps up in these major events and that's all you can ask for,” Santner said of the curly-haired all-rounder.

“He understands his game at such a young age already.

“He's got such a massive future ahead. He even took the ball in hand and put the pressure back on them today.” 

Rohit paid rich tributes to India's spin attack for their crucial role in the team's successful campaign.

“Not just this game but from the beginning [of the tournament], I thought our spinners in particular [excelled],” he said.

“There is so much expectation when you play on a pitch like this but they never disappointed.

“We used that to our advantage, we played some very good cricket and our bowling was very consistent.”

Rohit was particularly pleased with Chakravarthy, who took five wickets in a group match against New Zealand and claimed two in the final against the same opponents.

“He's got something different about him,” Rohit said of the 'mystery spinner' whose variations include off-break, leg-break, googly and the 'carrom ball' that he pushes with his knuckle.

“He didn't start in the tournament for us but he got five wickets against New Zealand and we saw the ability he possesses with the ball. We wanted to maximise that.”

Overall Santner, in his first global tournament as New Zealand skipper, was not too unhappy how they fared in the eight-team competition.

“It's been a good tournament. We played some good cricket today but we fell short to a better team,” the spinner said.

Santner felt the Black Caps could not dominate the Indian spinners in the middle overs.

“We lost a few wickets after the power play and they really got the squeeze on.

“Credit to how they played, they're world class spin bowlers. We were probably about 20 runs under what we wanted but we just went out looking to restrict them.”

Reuters