India again came under pressure in a knockout match as defending champions Australia stormed into their seventh consecutive ICC Women’s T20 World Cup final with a five-run win on Thursday.
Cape Town: India again came under pressure in a knockout match as defending champions Australia stormed into their seventh consecutive ICC Women’s T20 World Cup final with a five-run win on Thursday. Batting after winning the toss, Australia made a challenging score of 172 for four due to India’s poor fielding and leaving chances to catch catches. India lost three wickets for 28 runs but came back in the match with a 41-ball 69 from captain Harmanpreet Kaur (52 runs, 34 balls) and Jemimah Rodriguez (43 runs, 24 balls). .
Need 39 runs in 5 overs
India needed 39 runs in the last 30 balls, which was not very difficult and had five wickets left. But the past story was repeated again and the team could only score 167 runs for eight wickets in the stipulated 20 overs. The Indian team also lost to five-time champions Australia in the last World Cup final and recently faced defeat in the final of the Commonwealth Games.
After the defeat in the knockout match, India’s long wait for the world title increased further. After the cheap dismissals of explosive batsman Shefali Verma and star batsman Smriti Mandhana, Rodrigues and Harmanpeet ensured that the boundaries kept coming. Indian captain Harmanpreet Kaur decided to play this knockout match despite high fever a day earlier, hitting Jeff Jonassen for a lofted six over long-on.
Rodrigues was batting aggressively from the start, hitting Ashley Gardner for consecutive fours off the first two balls. After ten overs, India’s score was 93 runs for three wickets and the team seemed to be moving towards victory. But Rodrigues’s innings ended on a slow ball from Darcy Brown, who touched his bat and caught the wicketkeeper. Harmanpreet was looking in her best form and was hitting great strokes.
Deepti Sharma, India’s most consistent spinner in the tournament, bowled a lot of short deliveries in her opening spell. 12 runs were scored in his second over in which Mooney hit a massive six over wide long off. Apart from the inconsistent line and length of the bowlers, India wasted a lot of runs due to poor fielding and dropping catches. Taking full advantage of the lifeline he got at the start of his innings, Lanning scored an unbeaten 49 off 34 balls, including two sixes and a four off Renuka in the 20th over.
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Rodrigues was batting aggressively from the start, hitting Ashley Gardner for consecutive fours off the first two balls. After ten overs, India’s score was 93 runs for three wickets and the team seemed to be moving towards victory. But Rodrigues’s innings ended on a slow ball from Darcy Brown, who touched his bat and caught the wicketkeeper. Harmanpreet was looking in her best form and was hitting great strokes.
Renuka scored 41 runs in four overs and did not take any wickets. Sneh Rana, playing in place of Pooja Vastrakar, could not take any wicket, although she troubled the batsmen with her balls. Lanning could have been out behind the wicket in her first over but wicketkeeper Richa Ghosh missed the chance. Richa also wasted Lanning’s stumping chance completely. Australia added 59 runs in the last five overs.
