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Defending 13 in the last over and then six from the last ball after having conceded five wides off the second delivery, Mitchell Starc got the job done for Australia against New Zealand in Dharamsala last weekend. As captain Pat Cummins ran in grinning to hug, Starc, far from displaying the body language of a bowler who has just had the last laugh in a high-scoring thriller, was strangely impassive.
On Saturday evening in Ahmedabad as Jonny Bairstow tickled a swinging yet seemingly harmless length ball down the leg to the wicket-keeper at the start of England’s innings, Starc high-fived his team-mates wearing a wide smile.
Clearly, the Australia left-arm pacer is at his happiest, and at his lethal best, when he gets it swinging and strikes with the new ball. Which, apart from the swipe by India’s Ishan Kishan in Australia’s first game and the chop-on by Netherlands’ Max O’Dowd in their fifth, hadn’t happened for Starc in this World Cup. In their seventh game against England, Starc’s new-ball burst took out Bairstow and Joe Root inside five overs to set the tone for Australia’s defence of 286 and pump in another shot of positivity around the five-time champions’ escalating campaign.
Starc’s World Cup legacy can’t merely be defined by numbers, which are astounding anyway; his couple of wickets on Saturday took him past Lasith Malinga (56 wickets in 29 matches) as the third highest wicket-taker in ODI World Cup history with 58 scalps in 25 outings. It’s as much about his incredible ability to elevate his stature — and invariably of that World Cup edition — with a moment of magic. Think 2015 World Cup and Starc’s ripping inswinger to Brendon McCullum that killed the final as a contest in the first over. Think 2019 World Cup and Starc’s yorker that crashed into the stumps and made Ben Stokes kick his bat in frustration.
Think 2023 World Cup and… well, no Starc special yet.
Not that he hasn’t been among the wickets. Except against New Zealand — it was the first instance of Starc going wicketless in his World Cup career — Australia’s strike weapon has ticked the wickets column in every match. However, not at a time when that weapon can destruct the most and the team needs the most – in the powerplay.
Starc’s new-ball struggles reflected in Australia’s early stutter. Except that brief period against India (2/3, remember?), Australia’s powerplay bowling appeared toothless. And Starc was a big reason behind that. Between his dismissals of Kishan and O’Dowd, Australia did not take a single wicket in the first 10 overs with South Africa, Sri Lanka and Pakistan all piling on century opening stands. Unfamiliar territory for Starc and the Aussies.
A touch of fortune, courtesy Bairstow’s strangle down the leg, brought the familiarity along. “I’ll take that one with a smile,” Starc told ABC Sport podcast.
It gave him the little opening, and off he went doing his thing. The left-armer got Root driving into an error (Marcus Stoinis dropped a straightforward catch at cover) and Dawid Malan struck with his feet on the crease at a full, outswinging delivery that was regal yet unrewarding. But Starc kept at it, and with one that held its line finally had Root caught behind.
“It’s probably been a bit up-and-down in (terms of) where I want to be throughout this tournament, but it was nice to get some powerplay wickets tonight,” Starc said in the podcast after Saturday’s win. “And there’s still a couple of games in the group stages to keep progressing.”
Even in that “up-and-down” phase when Starc was searching for rhythm and early wickets as well as leaking runs, Australia kept faith in their go-to bowler in World Cups to make his presence felt in India.
“In 50-overs cricket there’s the new ball, the middle phase and the last phase and it’s pretty hard to nail all three. He’s one of the rare bowlers that swings it up front, but you can basically give him the ball at any time and you feel like he’s going to create something,” Cummins said in Dharamsala. “He just keeps getting better and better.”
Australia will hope that indeed is the case in this World Cup too as far as their strike weapon’s new-ball bowling is concerned.
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