Cummins and Co aim to ‘silence’ hostile home crowd
Australia captain Pat Cummins has urged his side to "embrace" the challenge of facing a hostile crowd when they play in-form hosts India in Sunday's World Cup final in Ahmedabad.
A capacity crowd of around 130,000 is expected to roar on India.
The hosts are bidding for a third World Cup title and second on home soil after their 2011 triumph.
But five-time champions Australia are a team full of big-match performers who also know what it's like to play in cricket-crazy India from their time in the Indian Premier League.
"I think you've got to embrace it, the crowd's obviously going to be very one-sided," Cummins told a pre-match news conference on Saturday.
"But also in sport, there's nothing more satisfying (as an opposition player) than hearing a big crowd go silent and that's the aim for us tomorrow."
And while he accepted the dimensions of Sunday's match would be different to any his side had experienced before, Cummins said: "We play over here in India a lot so the noise is not something new.
"I think on this scale it's probably bigger than we would have experienced before but it's not something totally foreign to what we've had before.
"Everyone deals with it slightly differently -- you see Davey (Warner) probably dancing and winning the crowd over, other guys just staying in their own bubble –- it should be good."
Victory on Sunday would cap a remarkable 2023 for Australia that saw them narrowly lose a Test series in India before defeating India in a World Test Championship final in England, where they also went on to retain the Ashes after a drawn campaign.
"It's been a huge year," said Cummins. "These are four marquee events.
"Some of the guys probably spent less than a couple of weeks in their own bed since the end of the Aussie summer," added Cummins, also the skipper of Australia's Test team.
"The guys have been awesome. They're so up for every game they play. To put ourselves in this position, it (winning the World Cup) would just top off an incredible year."
Road to the final
Australia bounced back from defeats to India and South Africa in their opening matches, and sitting in last place on the table, before going on to win the remaining seven matches, and qualify with 14 points.
Pat Cummins' side were slight underdogs in their re-match with South Africa come semi-final time, though the Aussies made an emphatic start, holding South Africa to 24 for four. David Miller's century gave the Proteas hope, though it was Cummins and Mitchell Starc who would wield their bats aloft in victory, holding on in a tense three-wicket win.
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