India bowling coach Paras Mhambrey couldn’t agree more. “The toss was crucial and made the difference because the way the wicket played in the first innings and then in the second, it was a contrast. The ball was coming on to the bat a lot easier for the Australians,” said the former India pacer.

Dravid however, made no bones of the fact that the Indian batting was below par on the night, but went on to explain why that happened. “We did not bat well enough, but the Australians bowled really well and used the slower deliveries nicely. Also, we are a team that enjoy hitting boundaries, but they managed the bigger side of the boundary well and we weren’t able to get boundaries [India managed to hit just two boundaries between the 11th and the 40th over]. There was a conscious effort to try and take the game deep, but we kept losing wickets. Every time we felt that we built a partnership and can start going, we lost a wicket. So, we had to get back to consolidation mode. We lost Virat [at 148-4 in 28.3 overs], then Jaddu [178-5 in 35.5] and then [KL] Rahul [203-6 in 41.3] at critical times. And at 240, they were always just one partnership away from getting there.”

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Emotional dressing room  

The entire nation has felt the emotional downturn of this defeat and the Indian team’s dressing room was no different. “Rohit is very disappointed obviously as are many of the boys in the dressing room. There were a lot of emotions in that dressing room. It was tough to see as a coach because you know these boys personally and I know how hard these guys have worked, what they’ve put in, the sacrifices they’ve made. But that’s sport. We’ll reflect and move on because that’s what you do as sportsmen. You have some great highs and lows in sport. You don’t stop because if you don’t put yourself on the line, you don’t put yourself in games like these, you don’t experience the great highs or the great lows. And if you don’t, you don’t learn,” he concluded.