With Australia’s Twenty20 team struggling in India only days after winning the 50-over World Cup, captain Pat Cummins stated Tuesday that cricketers were “not robots.”
Seven members of Australia’s World Cup-winning side remained in India for a five-match T20 series that began four days after the November 19 final.
The first two matches were won by a second-string India team, and six of the seven players are now expected to return home, according to reports in Australia. The third T20 is scheduled for later Tuesday.
According to accounts, Ben McDermott, Josh Philippe, and Chris Green were among the reinforcements brought to relieve the faltering World Cup heroes.
With a full domestic cricket season ahead, featuring Test matches against Pakistan and the West Indies, Cummins acknowledged the strain on the players, some of whom had been in India since September.
“They’re humans, not robots,” he said to reporters at the Sydney Cricket Ground.
“Putting everything into a World Cup and then playing a couple of days later — I probably don’t begrudge them if they’re not at 100 percent.”
“These are still games for Australia,” the skipper added, “and it’s great that these tours do provide opportunities for some of the younger guys, or guys who might not be in the first eleven.”
“I think these are important tours and you can get a lot out of them.”
David Warner, who was dropped from the T20 team on the eve of the India series, is poised to retire from Test cricket after the Pakistan series.
Warner’s Test place has been called into question following a poor run of red-ball play, although the 37-year-old was Australia’s best scorer in the World Cup, with 535 runs.
Warner is “hitting the ball beautifully at the moment,” according to Cummins.
“He wasn’t just playing for himself out there, he would go and take the game on, be really brave, and really take it to the opposition,” he added of Warner’s performances in India.
The first Test against Pakistan is scheduled to begin on December 14 in Perth, followed by the Boxing Day encounter in Melbourne. The third and final Test will begin on January 3 at Warner’s home ground, Sydney Cricket Ground.