More than the result of this game, it is the rain which is to be blamed as all the three games which Australia played were marred by rains, with two of them being washed out without a result. The world champions were given a lifeline when the rain came down at the right time against New Zealand and save them from a difficult position but they were robbed of a win against Bangladesh when they were just a few overs away from defeating Tigers.
Talking about this game, Australian bowlers got their team off to a great start which was worrying Bangladesh, whose stay in the tournament was to be decided by the result this game. Mitchell Starc with his first wicket in the very first over followed by two quick wickets from his new ball partner Josh Hazlewood put England in worry right from the start but then it was a different ball game for Ben Stokes and Eoin Morgan.
Both the players shared 159 runs for the fourth wicket to keep their team continue their winning momentum. When Morgan got out just 13 runs ahead of his country, Jos Buttler took over the role perfectly and did not let wicket fall down. As soon as Stokes completed his century, rain started coming down which resulted in the remaining of the game being called off with England being declared as the winner by 40 runs on D/L method.
Australian skipper was disappointed with the performance of Australian cricket and blamed top order for the loss. Here is what he said after the game.
Steven Smith: It is disappointing. We did not play our best game. We did well to start off with the bat but we lost I think five wickets for 15 runs. When you play against England we cannot afford that. We have played a lot of cricket and need to come out and play at the big stage. Today we did not do that and there were a few soft dismissals. After the rain break we weren’t up to our best with the bowling. Morgan and Stokesy played well and we gave them a few freebies as well. I think the balance was okay. The guys just did not step up and get those big scores. A few games did not go our way with the rain and on and off and losing a bit of momentum. You have got to take the onus as a top four and unfortunately nobody did that.