After throwing away the first game through a lack of composure with the bat,Australia have found the going tougher and tougher with every match to the point of not being competitive on Tuesday.
The batting lacked spark against a Windies attack heavily focused on defence,and the bowlers were left with too much to do to protect a modest target of 142.
There was a marked contrast in the approaches taken by both sides. Whereas the Windies are relying on spin to win on the slow pitches,Australia are looking to blast the opposition out with express pace.
The Windies’ spin combination of Fabian Allen,Hayden Walsh and Chris Gayle returned the figures of 3-53 from nine overs. Australia’s frontline pace trio of Mitchell Starc,Josh Hazlewood and Riley Meredith’s 10.5 overs yielded 4-96.
With Ashton Agar unavailable,Australia picked just the one slow bowler in Adam Zampa,who was smacked for three sixes in a row by Gayle.
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Hazlewood,too,was taken apart by Gayle though Starc bounced back from a poor start to the series with the figures of 1-15,the most economical four-over return of his 38-game T20 international career.
Instructively,the wicket of Gayle came via non-traditional means:a slower-ball bouncer from Meredith.
Moises Henriques said selectors faced a conundrum with their pace stocks:do they follow the Windies’ lead by taking pace off the ball or do they continue to back their high-speed artillery?
“Our bowlers are slightly different style to theirs,there’s definitely things we can learn,” Henriques said.
“Guys like Mitch and Josh have these fantastic attributes and assets you don’t want to waste all the time on being defensive either. It’s a bit of a catch-22.”
Australia’s batsmen are having a devil of a time finding balance in their play. Guilty of taking too many risks in the series-opener,they were unable to take the Windies bowlers out of their comfort zone in this game,clearing the rope just twice.
Aaron Finch struggled to kick on after scoring 30 at less than a run a ball while Henriques and the recalled Ashton Turner could not accelerate in the final overs.
“As a batting group as well it’s finding a way to score off that defensive bowling,” Henriques said.
“We have to find a way to put them under pressure when they do start bowling that. We saw tonight at the end I wasn't able to capitalise and score quickly enough like I should have been the last few overs,and didn’t have the answers I should have to that style of bowling.”