World Cup 2019: 3 most defining moments for each team in this tournament

India

The collective failure of the Indian top order knocked India out

#1 The untimely injury to Shikhar Dhawan

In India’s second match against Australia, Shikhar Dhawan scored his sixth century in ICC tournaments to take the team to a comfortable win. But he fractured his thumb during the course of his hundred which ruled him out of the World Cup. That had forced a change in the Indian batting order with KL Rahul opening the batting along with Rohit Sharma.

Before Dhawan’s injury, Rahul had settled in the No 4 position for India. Now after Dhawan’s injury, the No 4 position once again became a bother for India. Though Dhawan’s replacement Rishabh Pant tried his best to fill in the void, his inexperience and poor shot selection hurt India at crucial moments.

#2 The collective failure of the top order in the semi-final

India sailed through the semi-finals with ease on the batting might of the top order. Before the semi-final, Rohit Sharma was the top scorer in the tournament with 648 runs and Virat Kohli had scored 443 runs. KL Rahul was not far behind with 360 runs. But the top three combined to score a mere 3 runs in the semi-final against New Zealand. The fragile Indian middle-order could not cope with the loss of early wickets and India crashed out of the tournament. The Indian top order failed to deliver at a crunch moment.

#3 The demotion of MS Dhoni to No. 7 position

When the Indian scorecard was reading like a football scorecard struggling at 5-3, Dhoni could have been the ideal choice to arrest the slide. He had the experience and patience to play out the remaining overs under trying conditions. But the Indian team management decided to send in Dinesh Karthik and Hardik Pandya ahead of MS Dhoni which was a big blender. In the end, India had to pay a big price for their imprudence.