Sawt Falasteen - Angry Gambhir hits out at critics of India's one-venue advantage

India will face South Africa or New Zealand in the final on Sunday in Dubai. India have played all their matches at the same venue after they refused to tour nominal hosts Pakistan for the eight-nation event.

Lahore would have hosted the final had India missed out.

India remain unbeaten with four victories at the Dubai International Stadium, while other teams have had to travel between three Pakistani cities and Dubai.

South Africa were forced to travel to Dubai despite not knowing if they would even be playing their semi-final there, and then had to travel straight back to Pakistan after India's win over New Zealand.

India also knew they would be playing the first semi-final before the tournament even started if they got that far, while other teams had to wait to see where India finished in their group.

India are unbeaten in the 10 ODIs they have played in Dubai, winning nine.

"First of all, this is as neutral a venue for us as it is for any other team," an agitated Gambhir told reporters, insisting India had not enjoyed any advantage over other teams because they were not playing at home.

"We have not played here. I don't remember which tournament we played in this stadium last. And in fact, we didn't plan anything like that...

"The plan was that if you pick two front-line spinners in the 15-man squad, then even if we played in Pakistan or anywhere, we would have picked two front-line spinners because it was a competition on the subcontinent."

India won their last group match against New Zealand with four spinners and emerged victorious again with similar tactics.

- No 'spin trap' -

"It was nothing like we wanted to set up a spinners' trap," Gambhir said, focusing on the pitch rather than the discrepancies in travel between teams and schedule concerns.

"If you look at it, we only played one front-line spinner in the first three matches. We only played two front-line spinners in this match or the previous match. So, it was nothing like that.

"And there's a lot of debate about the undue advantage and all that. What undue advantage? We haven't practised here even for a day. We're practising at the ICC Academy.

"If you look at the wickets there and here, the difference is between the ground and the sky. Some people are just perpetual cribbers, man.

"They've got to grow up. So, I feel that there was nothing like we had any undue advantage or we had planned something like that."

Australia elected to bat and posted 264 all out after strong knocks from captain Steve Smith, who made 73, and Alex Carey, who hit 61.

India rode Virat Kohli's 84 and an unbeaten 42 by KL Rahul to achieve their target with 11 balls to spare.

"I think it's probably nice to stay at the same venue three times in a row. They are a quality team and, no doubt, they would have played good cricket in Pakistan," said Carey.

"But I think just setting up run chases and probably knowing the tempo of the game, probably helps a little bit but Virat Kohli does a pretty good job in most venues around the world."

C.AbuSway--SF-PST