The Indian team might have managed to draw their one-off Test against England last week in Bristol, but the Indian middle-order didn’t perform to their expectations. Experienced players like Mithali Raj and Harmanpreet Kaur couldn’t middle the ball and got out on single digits in both innings.
Indian Skipper and her deputy together contributed a total of 18 runs in both innings. While in top order, Shafali Varma hit two half-centuries, including her magnificent knock of 96 and Smriti Mandhana scored one half-century in the first inning but the middle-experienced order couldn’t deliver in the Bristol Match.
Even the lower order performed at their best in the match, with Sneh Rana saving the day with her 144-run partnership with Taniya Bhatia in the second inning and Deepti Sharma scoring a half-century too in the second innings too.
“It was nice to potentially open a few wounds on some of their middle-order players that didn’t get away, it’s nice for us to have thrown those punches early on a few of their players.” said batter Winfield-Hill in an interview with Sky Sports.
“They also had some players who had some good success against us, so we will go back to the drawing board and make sure we come hard at them. There have certainly been some good battles already and I’m sure that will continue in the one-day and T20 series,” she added.
Wicket-keeper batter Lauren Winfield-Hill made her international debut in 2013 against Pakistan. Since then, she has represented England in 4 Test matches, 43 One-Day Internationals, and 40 T20 Internationals. Out of the 43 ODIs, she has opened in 27 of them.
For the last few ODI matches, Winfield-Hill has played in all the other positions other than the opening. She has been positioned at no. 3, 6, and 7 in the past few years. But now she is ready to make a strong opening-comeback in white-ball cricket.
“I’m pretty keen [to open], that’s no secret. I sort of lost my way the last couple of years, trying to be a good team person, playing lots of roles but probably none of them particularly well. I wasn’t being true to myself.”
She further said, “The last year or so I’ve gone back to what’s familiar and that’s opening the batting. If the opportunity arises, it’s one I’d be massively excited for, because it’s what I want to do.”
India will play their first ODI against England at the same venue as the Test match, Bristol County Ground on June 27.
Source: Sky Sports