BENGALURU: There was a moment when it looked like David Warner’s spell of misfortune was set to continue. He was on 10 when he top-edged Shaheen Shah Afridi towards Usama Mir at mid-on. It was the kind of catch that would have been safely caught ninety-nine out of a hundred times. But this time, the ball sprang out of Usama’s palms, slid down his chest and landed on the grass. As it turned out, Warner’s story had quite a few chapters left.
Friday was the most memorable stop yet on the David Warner farewell tour. Back in June, the Australian had revealed a carefully laid out plan detailing exactly when he would retire from each form of cricket. A Test farewell would come at home in Sydney in January. T20s would be the last stop on the train, Warner intending to play on till the World T20 next year.
And his ODI journey would end with the World Cup. It takes quite the audacity to plan out a year-long retirement schedule, especially in Australian cricket where a personality as big as Steve Waugh was asked to hang up his ODI cap, much before he wanted to. But then, this is Warner. This is a man whose career was supposed to end five years ago on an ugly note, after being handed a one-year ban post the infamous SandpaperGate. Yet here he still was, smacking bowlers in green all around Chinnaswamy Stadium.
Before Friday, Warner’s World Cup was not going according to plan. His 41 against India came off 76 balls and it looked laborious. He looked every bit an aged warrior, shorn of his strength and speed, reduced to sheathing his sword and hiding behind his shield. Against South Africa, he managed only 13. He looked good in the six balls he faced against Sri Lanka, but that ended with a bitter Warner lashing out, after being on the wrong end of a close LBW call.
Even his most ardent supporter would have feared that his petulance would be the lasting image of his final World Cup. But against Pakistan, Warner somehow time-travelled back to his prime. When he returned to the fold post his ban, Warner, once called ‘The Bull’, was nicknamed ‘Hum-Bull’, a nod by his teammates to his newfound maturity. On Friday though, there was no hum, just the bull. Perhaps that dropped catch was the fuel he needed, for immediately after that, he unleashed a biblical onslaught. Haris Rauf’s ninth went for 24 runs, the highlight of that over being a scooped six on one knee. Another huge six followed in the next over off Ifthikar Ahmed.
Warner’s fifty came off just 39 balls and his brutality only increased after that. Rauf kept coming in for some harsh treatment. He predictably slowed down as he approached his hundred. But when it came, it did so in good time, taking only 85 balls. This was his fifth hundred at a World Cup, one behind the legendary Sachin Tendulkar and two behind Rohit Sharma. Astonishingly, this was his fourth straight ton in a row against Pakistan, a run that stretches back six years! They would, no doubt, be hoping not to run into him ever again.
Brief scores Australia 367/9 in 50 ovs (Warner 163, Marsh 121; Shaheen 5/54) bt Pakistan 305 in 45.3 ovs (Shafique 64, Imam 70; Zampa 4/53).
