T20 World Cup semifinal: India's costliest mistake? Not heeding ground reality at the last

Apart from Zampa, New Zealand's Ish Sodhi reaped benefits (2/31) against Ireland. Pakistan leg-spinner Shadab Khan (2/30) shone in the must-win game against Bangladesh last Sunday. England's Adil Rashid kept it tight in the semifinal (1/20) and dismissed the in-form Suryakumar Yadav. Liam Livingstone (0/21) did not claim a wicket, but he did not leak too many runs either.

T20 cricket is now more about data and statistics, and India may have missed a trick by not fielding Chahal, the sole leg-spinner in the squad with a good record against England in the shortest format — 16 wickets in 11 games.

The 32-year-old leggie, who specialises in googly and loopy flighted deliveries, sat out the entire World Cup. The conditions were more suited to the left-arm spin of Axar Patel and off-spinner R. Ashwin, plus they have the batting skills, the lack of which has often proved to be a roadblock for Chahal.

A chess player-turned-cricketer, Chahal is a shrewd operator. He is known for choking runs between the seventh and the 15th over. Unfortunately, he missed the World Cup bus in 2021 in the United Arab Emirates. Leg-spinner Rahul Chahar was selected ahead of Chahal as he was quicker through the air, but Chahal worked on his bowling. Now, his sudden change of pace has been making life difficult for batters.

Ashwin vs Axar vs Chahal

Chahal was likely to play his maiden T20 World Cup game in Australia, and Adelaide was his best chance. He would have had it easy to set the batters up with a loopy delivery, followed by a straighter one, two leg-spinners and a wrong 'un. He is not scared to go for runs, and the batters are either out-caught or bowled. It is hard to survive Chahal if one mistimes a shot, especially while targeting the shorter square boundaries like at the Adelaide Oval.

It is not that Chahal's spin is ineffective in Australia. He returned with figures of 2/15 in the practice match against Western Australia XI at the start of the tour in Perth and then cleaned up Steve Smith in the warm-up game against Australia in Brisbane.

In India's limited-overs tour of Australia in 2020, Chahal picked up three wickets in the Canberra T20I, which included Steve Smith, Aaron Finch and Moises Henriques to earn the player of the match award. He dismissed Smith again in the next game as India wrapped up the series with a match to spare. And in ODI cricket, he took 6/42 against the Aussies in Melbourne in January 2019.

The English cricketers have struggled against Chahal. His best T20I bowling performance (6/25) in Bengaluru in 2017 came against England. And in the last tour in July, Chahal was instrumental in India's 2-1 series win as he ended with four wickets in two games in Southampton and Birmingham. Among his victims were Moeen Ali, Harry Brook and Dawid Malan.

Axar is a like-for-like replacement for injured all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja. The overcast conditions initially did not allow him to bowl his full quota, not even in the powerplay, which has been his strength as a bowler. But if Chahal had to be in, Axar had to be out in the knockout encounter. Ashwin is a World Cup and Champions Trophy winner. He brings in experience in big games.

The former Australia all-rounder Shane Watson had a similar train of thought regarding Chahal at the end of the match.

"India did not have a wrist spinner, and England had two. In hindsight, they certainly missed Chahal. He can control his pace like Rashid did tonight. He has incredible skills and would have been brilliant,” he told the broadcasters at the end of the game.

Chahal will have to wait two more years to make his T20 World Cup debut.