Australia thrashed India by nine wickets in the third Test match of the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy on Friday. After suffering an embarrassing loss, India captain Rohit Sharma said his side was not brave and did not apply themselves in the game.
The men in blue are in a 2-1 lead in the four-match Test series. After losing two back-to-back matches, the Aussies fought back strongly to register a memorable win and secure their place in the World Test Championship (WTC) final.
"When you are playing on challenging pitches you have to bowl. We allowed their bowlers to bowl in one spot. Not to take any credit away from their bowlers, Nathan Lyon especially. We had to try and be brave, which I think we were not," Rohit said at the presentation ceremony.
Lyon finished with his second career-best figures of 8/64, in India's second innings.
"One odd game can happen like that where things don't come together, but even then you need players to come together and chip in. We wanted a few guys to stand up but it didn't happen. We were slightly behind and we did not apply ourselves the way we would have liked to," he added.
Rohit said that the team will need to quickly regroup after the heavy defeat.
"When you lose a Test match, there's a lot of things that didn't go our way. To start with, we didn't bat well in the first innings. We understand how important it is to put runs on the board in the first innings. And obviously, when they got an 80-90 run lead, we needed to put in a big performance with the bat but we couldn't do that," the Indian skipper said.
"Honestly, we haven't thought about it (Ahmedabad Test) yet. We just finished this Test now so we need to regroup and try. We need to understand that we need to improve as a team," he added.
The hosts were bowled out for 163 in their second innings, leaving Australia with a target of just 76 runs. Both teams will face each other again in the fourth Test starting on March 9 at the Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad. India will want to win the match in order to seal their berth at the WTC final.
Also Read:
Messi, we're waiting for you: Gunmen leave threatening message for legendary player
