Australians are the clear favourites in the Champions Trophy semifinals on Wednesday against New Zealand in Mohali.
Australia team (from) : Ricky Ponting (captain), Adam Gilchrist (wicket-keeper), Simon Katich, Michael Hussey, Andrew Symonds, Damien Martyn, Michael Clarke, Shane Watson, Brett Lee, Brad Hogg, Nathan Bracken, Dan Cullen (replaced Stuart Clark), Glenn McGrath and Mitchell Johnson
New Zealand team (from) : Stephen Fleming (captain), Nathan Astle, Shane Bond, James Franklin, Peter Fulton, Mark Gillespie, Brendon McCullum (wicket-keeper), Hamish Marshall, Kyle Mills, Jacob Oram, Jeetan Patel, Scott Styris, Daniel Vettori and Lou Vincent
Group A, Match 6 IND vs AUS: Just another batting practice for Australia
Oct 29, 2006
Australia methodically disseminated the Indian seamers and reached the target with 6 wickets and 26 balls to spare.
Watson 50, Ponting 58 and Martyn 73* all hit half centuries while Sreesanth took 2 wickets.
They will meet New Zealand in the Semis.
Earlier India lost Sachin Tendulkar early for 10 (26 balls), but fought back with fifties by Virender Sehwag (65) and Rahul Dravid (52) to reach 249/8 in 50 overs. Kaif (30) and Dhoni (28) also chipped in with useful runs.
The injured Yuvraj Singh and Ajit Agarkar were replaced by Shantakumaran Sreesanth and Dinesh Mongia, while Mohammad Kaif is in for Rudra Pratap Singh.
Reported Earlier:
Australia is keeping the same side which beat England as they look to go beyond the semis for the first time in the tournament's history. If India lose it will be the first time since the 1975 World Cup that no subcontinental team will be in the last four of a major competition.
Australia (Playing XI): A C Gilchrist, S R Watson, R T Ponting, D R Martyn, A Symonds, M E K Hussey, M J Clarke, M G Johnson, B Lee, N W Bracken, G D McGrath India (Playing XI): Sehwag, S R Tendulkar, I K Pathan, R Dravid, D Mongia, S K Raina, M S Dhoni, Harbhajan Singh, S Sreesanth, M Kaif, M M Patel
ICC Champions Trophy, Mohali: Australia (250-4) beat India 249-8 by six wickets
India are playing Australia in their last league tie at Mohali in a do-or-die situation.
In the 13 games that India played Australia after the last World Cup, they managed to win only twice - both times with the help of centuries from VVS Laxman.
But VVS Laxman is not in the team, and the ODI sepecialists who replaced him are not doing any thing special for some time now.
With openers Sehwag, who averages just 22.15 against them and Sachin, with scores of 5, 8, 27, 12 and 4 in the last five innings against Asutralia, things are not looking bright for the Indians.
Sreesanth, who was left out of the team might play today inplace of Agarkar who is out with an injury.
Yuvraj is also out of the list, after injuring himself while playing Kho-Kho just before the all important game!
The Australian cricket team is one of the leading international teams in world cricket. Australia was one of the first two Test nations (with England) and have an outstanding recent Test record and in the one dayers were World Champs in 1987, 1999 and 2003. They are also the leaders in the current ICC Test Nations table.
Dates in history of Australian cricket
November, 1868: 1868 Aboriginal cricket tour of England
15 March 1877: Test debut
28 December 1934: Women's Test team debut
5 January 1971: ODI Debut
23 June 1973: Women's ODI team debut
8 November 1987: Won 4th edition of Cricket World Cup by defeating England in the final match at Eden Gardens, Calcutta.
20 June 1999: Steve Waugh lifts the World Cup
23 March 2003: Ricky Ponting lifts the World Cup
