They will next tour the West Indies at the end of June.
Defending champions Australia have failed to retain the ICC World Test Championship (WTC) title against South Africa. Previously, Pat Cummins and Co. had won the championship by defeating WTC 2021 runners-up India by a huge margin of 209 runs at the Oval Stadium.
After the five-wicket defeat to the Proteas in the final, the Australian skipper revealed the loopholes which restricted them from retaining the silverware. He pointed out the batting disaster as South Africa bundled them out twice under a 220-run total. However, he also acknowledged the tremendous effort from the Proteas to win their maiden ICC Test Mace.
“Didn’t bat out the opposition after a decent first-innings lead. SA didn’t give us a chance in the fourth innings. There are concerns in the top seven. Aiden and Temba didn’t give us a chance. SA showed why they’re here and are deserved winners, they kept themselves in the game throughout. Huge achievement to make the final,” stated the skipper in the post-match presentation.
Notably, after getting all-out for 212, the Aussie bowlers made a strong comeback, headed by captain Cummins’ six-wicket haul, to bowl out SA for just 138. However, the Australian batters couldn’t captalise on the 74-run lead as they finished the third innings on 207. That total was achieved due to a fighting knock from the pacer Mitchell Starc (58 off 136) who was the highest scorer for Australia in that innings.
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Australia played 19 red-ball matches in the 2023-25 WTC cycle. Out of them, they won 13 and drawn two, to finish second in the qualification race for the final showdown with a percentage of 67.54.
The ICC No.1 ranked team in Tests has produced many notable performances throughout their latest WTC cycle. They started by levelling the Ashes 2-2 against arch-rivals England. Following this, the Aussies registered a 3-0 whitewash over Pakistan at home.
However, the West Indies restricted Cummins and Co. from finishing the summer unbeaten at home. Windies youngster Shamar Joseph’s astonishing seven-wicket haul in the second Test in Brisbane levelled the series 1-1.
But the mighty Australians soon caught up the pace by a 2-0 clean sweep over New Zealand. Then they restricted India to retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) for the third consecutive time. The Aussies came back from 0-1 to win the series 3-1 and qualified for the WTC Final in successive attempts. However, they will tour the West Indies at the end of June for a three-match Test series to kick off the next WTC cycle.
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