T20 World Cup: Cummins dismisses talk of Australia manipulating Scotland game

Senior Aussie seamer Pat Cummins has dismissed the possibility of Australia trying to manipulate the Scotland game result, which could result in knocking England out of the T20 World Cup, saying it’s against the spirit of the game. Days after his teammate Josh Hazlewood loosely remarked on how Australia could work a way out to eliminate England from the Super 8 race by narrowly winning against Scotland in their last league game, Cummins said the drawn plans are nowhere near this.

Cummins, who himself was the protagonist in the Bairstow run-out saga controversy during last year’s Ashes, which later got highlighted in Amazon Prime’s three-episode series called ‘The Test’, said Hazlewood joked about manipulating the Scotland game result, adding it should not be taken seriously.

Meanwhile, despite the talks of sending the defending champions packing inside the first round, the England Team kept themselves alive in the competition by hammering Oman in their latest league match to move ahead of Scotland in the required Net Run Rate (NRR) department.

For England to cruise ahead, they must beat Namibia in their final league game and hope for Australia to beat Scotland even by the tiniest margin.

“I think when you go out and play you are trying your best every time and if you are not, that’s probably against the spirit of cricket,” Cummins said ahead of the England-Oman game in St Lucia.

“Haven’t really thought too deeply because it’s never really popped up.

“I was speaking to Joshy (Hazlewood), who had a bit of a joke about it the other day, and think it got taken a little bit out of context. We’ll go there and just try and play Scotland, who have had a really good tournament so far and will be tough. It’s [net run rate] something you kind of discuss as one of the quirks of the set-up, but in terms of does it change the way we play, absolutely not,” he added.

He added that as a cricketer, he never stepped foot on the cricket field with a mindset other than that of winning.

“I’ve never stepped into the field without the mindset of trying to take the game on and be aggressive like the guys have so far,” Cummins said.

With Australia already cruising ahead to the next round with three wins in as many matches played, they are less likely to benefit from their game against Scotland other than trying to test their benched players.

Cameron Green, Josh Inglis and Ashton Agar could get included in the XI. However, per Cummins, he’s unsure what the selectors are thinking.

“I haven’t spoken to the selectors or anyone, so I don’t know what they’re thinking,” Cummins said of the option to rotate players. “But I wouldn’t be surprised. I know going into the start of the tournament, in a perfect world, we’d get a game into just about all the squad members.”

(With inputs from agencies)