They might have failed to conquer the ‘Final Frontier’ on their last tour of India, but Australia head coach Andrew McDonald feels their “subcontinent journey” helped them get the World Test Championship mace.
Having missed out due to over-rate penalties in the 2019-21 cycle, Australia on Sunday became the first team to win ICC world titles across formats when they defeated India by 209 runs in a lopsided WTC final at The Oval here.
“You can string down series in isolation, you can talk about the subcontinent journey where we went from Pakistan to Sri Lanka into India,” McDonald told reporters.
“We had to navigate through that. So, it was a tricky World Test Championship cycle and I think the wins in the subcontinent got us here.”
The Pat Cummins-led side had enjoyed some splendid wins in the subcontinent before travelling to India, where they lost the series but pulled off a win in Indore.
Shift of focus
Australia will now be looking to break a 22-year drought in England when the Ashes starts on Friday.
“Probably the next 24 hours we will switch our focus, in what you do to the Ashes and the first Test,” he said.
“We can’t wait for it to come around. First was the World Test Championship final. Let’s enjoy what the team’s been able to achieve over the last couple of years and then get excited about Edgbaston ball one.
“So one thing that we’ve got to factor into England is how we deny them those boundaries. There are a couple of things that we can potentially tidy up and take from this game into the next one,” the coach added.
Written with inputs from PTI
