Langer finds light at the end of the tunnel

Australia’s streak without an ODI series win stretched to more than two years with their defeat to India on Friday night, but coach Justin Langer says “there some light at the end of the tunnel” ahead of their World Cup defence later this year.

Langer pointed to the impressive performances of recently-axed Test batsmen Shaun Marsh and Peter Handscomb as well as young quick Jhye Richardson as positives in their series loss to India as he tries to find a winning formula ahead of their Cup opener on June 1.

Langer is yet to sing the team victory song after a series win since taking over as coach last year, but he’s confident that moment is drawing closer.

“I honestly believe we should take great confidence out of this series,” he said after India’s seven-wicket win at the MCG secured a 2-1 series win for the tourists.

“India are a gun side and we got very, very close to them.

“We could have won tonight if we’d taken our chances, we could have won the other night (in Adelaide). So we should take great confidence out of that.

“I honestly think there’s some light at the end of the tunnel for this team, I really do.

“We’ll take some great confidence out of not just this series, but the Test series, believe it or not.

“There’s been some real shining lights from this series. And hopefully we can keep finding some more shining lights over the next three or four months.”

Langer is an eternal optimist, but he rightly accentuated the positives provided by Handscomb’s recall and Richardson’s emergence after selectors took a punt on the pair for the series.

A re-modelled approach to batting built around the returns of Handscomb and Usman Khawaja has been vindicated in this series with scores of 288 and 298 in the opening two matches, totals they managed just three times from 13 matches in 2018.

And while a middle-order collapse against Indian leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal on Friday left Australia short of a competitive target, Langer says his batsmen have a “crystal clear” game plan heading into their Cup defence.

Now it’s just a matter of executing it.

“We’re very clear how we want to play our cricket, no doubt, and that’s a really good feeling,” he said.

“We executed it really well in the first two games, we didn’t quite get it today.

“We’re really clear how we want to play and we got really close this series. It came down to the last overs twice and we won the first one.

“We know what we’re trying to do. We just need our guys to execute the plans. And we’ve done it pretty well in this series, I reckon.”

Langer also praised the character of Handscomb and Marsh, Australia’s leading run-scorers in the series just days after they were axed from the Test squad to play Sri Lanka.

“I really admire what they’ve done,” he said.

“To be dropped … a lot of guys would have walked away with their tail between their legs, but they’ve stood up.

“The way they’ve both played is a great credit to their character.

“I really admire them, I really respect what they’ve done, and they’ll be better for it in the future.”

Gillette ODI Series v India

Australia ODI squad: Aaron Finch (c), Jason Behrendorff, Alex Carey (wk), Peter Handscomb, Usman Khawaja, Nathan Lyon, Mitch Marsh, Shaun Marsh, Glenn Maxwell, Jhye Richardson, Kane Richardson, Peter Siddle, Billy Stanlake, Marcus Stoinis, Adam Zampa

India ODI squad: Virat Kohli (c), Rohit Sharma (vc), Shikhar Dhawan, Ambati Rayudu, Dinesh Karthik, Kedar Jadhav, MS Dhoni (wk), Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Ravindra Jadeja, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Khaleel Ahmed, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, Vijay Shankar, Shubman Gill

First ODI: Australia won by 34 runs

Second ODI: India win by six wickets

Third ODI: January 18, MCG (D/N)