After a close 13-run win in the first match, India lost the second warm-up game against Western Australia XI at the WACA ground in Perth by a big margin of 36 runs.
Arshdeep Singh’s stuck with Josh Philippe’s wicket early on but the other opener, D Arcy Short, and number 3 Nick Hobson registered fifties in a 110-run stand. Harshal Patel broke the stand and Indian bowlers after that picked wickets regularly to restrict WA XI for 168/8 in 20 overs.
Senior off-spinner R Ashwin was the pick of the bowlers with all of his three wickets coming in a single over, while Harhal Patel took two and Arshdeep one. Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Deepak Hooda and Hardik Pandya bowled two overs each and Axar Patel bowled three.
India’s start was slow. Senior batters Rohit Sharma, Suryakumar Yadav and Virat Kohli didn’t play today and Rishabh Pant once again opened, this time with KL Rahul. Pant, who had scored 9 runs in the first warm-up match also managed only 9 runs today, and Deepak Hooda was dismissed for 6.
Hardik Pandya came out swinging for the fences and even hit a couple of sixes, but struggled otherwise in his 19-ball 17-run knock. Axar Patel and Dinesh Karthik, too, followed with cheap scores.
KL Rahul held on end to his end but was slow-ish batting at a strike rate of close to 100 for the first half of his innings before upping the ante to clatter some hits to the fence and revive the chase. KL Rahul hit 9 fours and 2 sixes, scoring 74 runs in 55 balls.
Once KL Rahul was dismissed on the second ball of the 19th over, with 41 runs needed off 10 balls, the game was effectively sealed.
Fans on Twitter trolled the likes of Rishabh Pant for his low score and even KL Rahul for his conservative game in the powerplay.
Here are some of the tweets in reaction to India’s 36-run loss to WA XI in the second warm-up match:
India fall well short in the end to finish on 8-132. 36-run defeat. Their batting struggled bar KL Rahul who made 74. Pandya next best with 17. Kohli and Rohit did not bat. Lance Morris was impressive with 2-23 off 4
— Tristan Lavalette (@trislavalette) October 13, 2022
India have lost the practice match against Western Australia by 36 runs.
— Mufaddal Vohra (@mufaddal_vohra) October 13, 2022
Western Australia club team beat India national team by 36 runs in a T20 match in Australia as a tribute to India’s 36 allout against Australia in Australia. Team 36 😂 #Cricket
— Daniel Alexander (@daniel86cricket) October 13, 2022
Thanks to @klrahul 👏👏👏
— Sahill Warhade (@Sahill_Warhade) October 13, 2022
36 runs😅 reminds of the test , hopefully what followed the 36 runs innings in test happens here when the actual matches start
— Prasanth.K.Alex (@hty89076) October 13, 2022
Yeah but look at the awesome pics and videos the boys made!
— karanbir singh (@karanbirtinna) October 13, 2022
Kl Rahul’s captaincy + losing because of his stat padding
Deadly combo 💥 https://t.co/FbhBEYpr5O— ⁴⁵ (@KDBklass) October 13, 2022
India Losing against Australia Farmers , and People think they beat Pakistan 😂😂#PakVind #INDvPAK https://t.co/twS8wVYJzR
— Ali Baloch 🇵🇰 (@btw_alii) October 13, 2022
“36 runs” 😭😭😭😭 https://t.co/I1wtlGtVBl
— Haseeb (@HaseebTweets) October 13, 2022
thanks to KL Rahul’s masterclass. https://t.co/N7NOkbqP73
— Arsh. (@JilShm) October 13, 2022
And, we expect them to win the world cup. They won’t even reach upto semis this time https://t.co/5oquWQKTic
— Pankaj Goyal (@thebibliobiuli) October 13, 2022
Has KL Rahul won anything as captain? Here he need to be real statpeddler. https://t.co/8vOOiyRfIt
— apkesh (@Apkeshchan) October 13, 2022
@BCCI group stage k baad ki hotel booking cancel karwa do…. Flight tickets ka bhi dekh lo abhi se… Baad m mengi milegi. #T20IWorldCup #indvswaca #Cricket #CricketTwitter https://t.co/irpDqgxk9r
— Abhinav Singh (@27_abhinav) October 13, 2022
Agla world cup kb hai doston? https://t.co/2hNxqCvJlN
— Aryan 🐦 (@sparkle_forrest) October 13, 2022
Warm-up match bhi haar gye😥 pic.twitter.com/RCD1lQ1oJN
— vaibhav hatwal2 ◟̽◞̽ 🤧 (@vaibhav_hatwal2) October 13, 2022
The Indian team will leave for Brisbane on October 14 where they will two official warm-up matches, against Australia on October 17 and New Zealand on October 19, before flying to Melbourne for their first game at T20 World Cup Super 12 stage – against Pakistan, on October 23.
