Australia suffered a very unexpected loss against Afghanistan in the Super 8s of the T20 World Cup 2024.
The Australian team failed to continue their stellar momentum from last year when they won the World Test Championship (WTC) Final and the 2023 ODI World Cup, both times outclassing India.
The Aussies got eliminated early this time around in the recently-concluded T20 World Cup 2024, failing to advance from the Super 8s stage to the knockouts.
The Mitchell Marsh-led side suffered a defeat to eventual champions India and a very unexpected loss against Afghanistan which nearly nullified their qualification chances.
However, what was more surprising than the loss was the absence of a pace stalwart from the Australia Playing XI.
The left-arm seamer was not in the best of forms in the tournament however, he has shown time and again in his career that he can deliver the goods in crucial fixtures.
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Interestingly, apart from dropping him in a crucial game in the 2024 World Cup Australia also dropped him in a must-win game against the same opposition in the 2022 World Cup in Adelaide.
Talismanic pacer Mitchell Starc revealed the reason on the Willow Talk podcast, as quoted by the Australian daily Sydney Morning Herald.
When quizzed about his absence from the game in 2024, Starc clarified, “No – two World Cups in a row.
The 34-year-old further confirmed that the decision to bring in a left-arm spinner in Ashton Agar was purely a tactical call.
“Just the match-up, they (team management) saw previous games on that ground in St. Vincent with spin playing a part and Ash (Ashton) and the left-arm enticing them to make a change. I think Ash (Ashton Agar) bowled pretty well in the powerplay. They (Afghanistan) probably played spin quite well and batting first probably assessed the conditions a little bit better than we did, and had a couple of stumbles that in the end cost us the game. It was probably the fielding that cost us again that game,” Starc added.
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