Australia defeated India by 11 runs in the final of ongoing Women’s T20 Tri-Series, ensuring their 100% series win record in the last 7 T20 Series.
Australia had to drop the last match’s Player of the Match Sophie Molineux due to corked thigh and this opened the door for 18-year-old Annabel Sutherland to play her 3rd International T20 match. India also made a change with 16-year-old debutant Richa Ghosh replacing Harleen Deol.
Australia decided to Bat first after winning the toss. It was a great decision by Australia as teams batting first had the fair advantage of the used pitch.
Australia Inning: Batting first, Australia had a shaky start as opener Alyssa Healy continued her recent plunge, scoring no more than a single figure in the last 5 innings. Beth Mooney was dropped by Gayakwad while batting at 13 runs. Mooney then anchored the Australian inning by steadily making two 50+ runs partnerships with Gardner and captain Meg Lanning. After the top-order collapse, Australians were desperate for a few big overs, which pressured Ellyse Perry to go big but resulted in getting caught on the boundary at long-on for a duck leaving Australia with 114/4 with 3 overs to go. Haynes, similar to Healy had been out of her form lately, resulted in an experiment of bringing Sutherland up the order to capitalize on right-left batting combination. It didn’t work well for Australians as she was outclassed stumping. Haynes’ cameo of 18 runs in 7 balls gave Australians the acceleration required in death overs. Australia scored 41 runs in the last 3 overs with 19 runs coming in the 20th over to set up the target of 156 for India to chase. Mooney scored 71 not out.
Smriti Mandhana had an exceptional #Triseries
Her last 5 T20I Scores read:66
55
45
35
15WHAT A PLAYER! 🙌#INDvAUS #AUSWvINDW pic.twitter.com/JE8nOlJSaL
— Female Cricket (@imfemalecricket) February 12, 2020
India Inning: Chasing 155, India lost its opener Shafali Verma (10), early on, courtesy Tayla Vlaeminck. Debutant Richa Ghosh struggled initially but scored 17 (22) and finally surrendered to Sutherland for her debut wicket. Vlaeminck struck again by dismissing Jemimah Rodrigues. 3 wickets down for 65, India needed a bit of luck and partnership in order to chase the 156 runs target. Mandhana looked in good shape and scored consecutive boundaries of Vlaemick and Sutherland overs and miss-fielding at few instances made India look balanced against Australia in the run chase. Mandhana and Kaur made 50 runs partnership during this time, but soaring run rate pressured India to commit errors and the batting collapsed like a pack of cards, 7 wickets for a paltry 29 runs. Smriti’s wicket was quite crucial from Australia’s viewpoint. India missed a couple of finishers to stay in the game. Jess Jonassen was their bowling hero with the career-best figure of 5 for 12 and was awarded by Player of the Match award.
Brief Scores:
AUSTRALIA WIN THE TRI-SERIES!
Australia Women won by 11 runs vs India Women.Australia: 156/6 (20)
India: 144/10 after 20 overs.Smriti Mandhana 66(37)
Jonassen 5/12 🏏#IndvAus #INDWvsAUSW pic.twitter.com/fBPbzgR5e4— Female Cricket (@imfemalecricket) February 12, 2020
Loves all things female cricket