Match Details
In pursuit of a hefty total of 197, the Indian batters succumbed to pressure early on by giving away three scalps in the powerplay. Southpaw Smriti Mandhana was the first one to return back as Darcie Brown outwitted her in the fourth delivery of the Indian innings.
Harleen Deol, the next batter in, allied with Shafali Verma 13(14) to bestow a brief period of respite for India before Verma departed trying for a maximum. Following Verma’s wicket, India failed to rotate the strike at regular intervals, and the building pressure trapped Harmanpreet Kaur in front 12(11).
To fan the flames, Harleen Deol, who was nearly striking at 150 was involved in a mix-up and had to turn back with a score of 24 (16). The Australian bowlers were inch-perfect and exploited the surface consistently by aggregating wickets at regular intervals.
Deepti Sharma orchestrated 53 (34), including 8 fours and 1 maximum, and gave out a fighting spirit but the target was too good to be chased down by her alone. Heather Graham only bowled two overs but grabbed 4 wickets, including a hat-trick. Other than that, Ashleigh Gardner also claimed a couple of wickets by giving away 20 runs.
Earlier in the day, after being invited to bat first, Australia registered 196/4 on board. In absence of Healy, veteran Beth Mooney was expected to pave the way for the middle order but she was chopped on by Anjali Sarvani early on in the first innings for the score of 2(4). That was soon followed by the wicket of Phoebe Litchfield 11(9).
When Australia was tottering at 72/4 at the halfway stage, Ashleigh Gardner and Grace Harris commenced an unimaginable assault and since then, the Indian bowlers lost the thread. The right-handed duo of Gardner and Harris stitched a partnership of 129 runs to cruise Australia past 190.
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