The most anticipated tour of the year, stumbled a little at the beginning, as the COVID restriction pushed the start of the series by 2 days and pushed all the matches to be held at Queensland instead of the initially planned cities. The multi-format point-based series consists of 3 ODIs, 1 Pink Ball Test, and 3 T20Is.
The Full Circle
It was the 3rd Delivery of the 50th Over in the 3rd and Final ODI of the India vs Australia series. Jhulan Goswami steps out to Sophie Molineux and hammers the ball straight down the ground for a boundary and with that it all came to a full circle.
Meg Lanning’s Australia, arguably the greatest cricket team to ever exist, riding on a 26-match-winning streak, finally accepted defeat. Against the same opponents, with whom their streak started 3.5 years ago, in 2018.
Jhulan Goswami, who was the villain of the 2 ODI, after conceding 13 runs in the last over of the match, which included two no balls, redeemed herself as the hero, after hitting the winning boundary.
The cruel fate that came with the no ball, which later became the most controversial and talked about topic, in the last delivery of the 2nd ODI, and denied India their much-deserved win, favored India as Sneh Rana, who ultimately would hit 3 back-to-back boundaries to assure the win for India, got saved by a no ball.
Battle of the Royals
Ever so dominant Australia saw a little set back as their two main bowlers, Jess Jonassen and Megan Schutt was found unavailable for the series due to injury and personal reasons respectively. But was the absence of the top ranked ODI bowlers supposed to bother the Mighty Australians? Their bench strength and depth in batting and bowling is well known in the cricket world. Nevertheless, this was just an opportunity for the likes of Darcie Brown, Tayla Vlaeminck, Hanna Darlington, Stella Campbell, Maitlan Brown to just show their amazing skills.
India on the other hand, were still not sure of their playing 11. The camp before the series, resulted in some surprise inclusions and exclusions. Yastika Bhatia got a call back after not getting any games in the South Africa series earlier this year and Meghna Singh and Renuka Singh Thakur got their maiden call up. Exclusion of Indrani Roy and Priya Punia saw some uproar among the fans as well. There was a lot to prove for this Indian side and a lot to sort out.
Rustiness? What is that?
The first ODI, started without India’s vice-captain Harmanpreet Kaur and Australia quick Tayla Vlaeminck and Nicola Carey as they suffered from injuries. Surprise inclusion for India was Yastika Bhatia, Richa Ghosh (who came in for Taniya Bhatia), and Meghana Singh (who replaced Shikha Pandey) in the playing X1.
India batted first, and it was painfully similar to the performances they had all this year. The same issues of Strike rotation and running between the wickets persisted as they finished on a below par 225.
Australia, who were supposed to be rusty after playing no games since the April, didn’t even show a glimpse of rustiness, as they easily finished the chase in 41 overs losing only 1 wicket. Vice-captain Rachael Haynes top scored with 93″, and Alyssa Healy and captain Meg Lanning scored 77 and 53* respectively.
The positives for India in this match was debutant Yastika Bhatia’s promising 35 and Richa Ghosh’s late flurry of 32 (29).
The closest anyone had come
After the pretty one-sided 1st match, India did a massive comeback in the second ODI. Batting first they scored 274, their highest total this year with the ace opener, Smriti Mandhana playing a masterful innings of 86. The lower middle order which always was a matter of concern for India, stepped up majorly and contributed 100+ runs in the last 18 overs to get the score to 274. Richa Ghosh, Pooja Vastrakar, Deepti Sharma and Jhulan Goswami all had great cameos.
In response, Australia struggled to get going. They lost Healy, Lanning and Ellyse Perry for single digits and was struggling at 52/4 in 15 overs. But Beth Mooney, who opened the innings in absence of Haynes, unavailable for elbow injury, and Tahila McGrath added 126 runs for the 5th wicket and brought the Aussies back into the game in the real Australian style.
McGrath scored a useful 74 of 77 balls and showed why this side is known for their never giving up attitude. All-rounder Nicola Carey Joined Mooney in the middle at the 39th over and they both took Australia to 262 in 49 overs, thanks to some very sloppy efforts on the field by the Indians.
The last over started with 13 runs required from 6 balls. Jhulan Goswami was given the ball. The dew factor had troubled India on the field and reduced the effectiveness of spinners for the last few overs. The two Aussies ran for 10 runs in the first five balls, which included a full toss no ball in the 3rd delivery and a few misfields all over the place. The last ball was a full toss too.
Nic Carey swung her bat and was caught at mid-wicket. The Indian ‘s were ecstatic thinking they had won, but fate had other plans. The waist high ball was soon called a no bell by the 3rd umpire and suddenly Australia had another ball and 2runs to win.
They took them easily and the no-ball went on to become the most controversial topic over the next two days. Multiple video analysis suggested that it might not have been a no ball and was too close to call. None-the-less the damage was done. Indians came the closest any one has ever been to breaking the Australian winnings streak in the last 3 years but returned empty handed.
Last and Final
It was difficult to bounce back from that defeat. We later got to know that the team specially Jhulan Goswami had to overcome terrible mental stress to be back in the 3rd ODI that started under 48 hours.
Australia batted first in the 3rd ODI and we saw a sedate start as they scored only 87 runs in 24.3 overs losing 4 wickets. The pace combination of Goswami and Meghana Singh troubled with the new ball. Lanning scored only her second duck in over 4 years and first time batting first.
Although Indians let them get going in the middle overs due to their sloppiness on the field. It was a horrendous fielding display from the Indian side as the dropped 4 straight catches and conceded multiple boundaries through misfields. As a result, Australia finished with 264 runs on the board, which very well should have been below 240.
India started steadily as their opening partnership again gave a good start with 59 runs in 10.3 overs before losing Mandhana. Youngsters Shafali Verma and Yastika Bhatia continued the innings and had a 100+ runs partnership for the second wicket. Shafali played an uncharacteristic innings of 56 runs from 91 balls.
Richa Ghosh, promoted to number 4, couldn’t get going and went for a duck in only the fourth ball she faced. India saw wicket falling regularly in the next 10 overs as they lost Bhatia, Raj, and Vastrakar in the next 10 overs. Bhatia scored a splendid innings of 64 of 69 balls before getting caught by a blinder taken by substitute fielder Molly Strano, after that Deepti Sharma played a useful innings of 31 in 30 balls and kept India in the hunt.
But the most important innings was played by none other than India’s hero of the one-off Test vs England, Sneh Rana. After getting a life, as Nic Carey’s delivery which saw her getting caught, was called a no ball, she smacked back to bad three boundaries and left India in an amazing position as only 6 runs were left to be chased in 8 balls. It was time for Jhulan and Meghana Singh to finish the job. After taking 3 singles, Jhulan smashed Molineux’s delivery for a four and with that ended Australia’s 3.5 yearlong dominance in the 50 over format.
However, Team Australia’s scary record of 26 straight wins will forever be remembered as one of the greatest runs by a team in the cricketing history and Meg Lanning and team will always be known as a legendary squad who showed tremendous character on the field.
There were a lot of positives for India to take out from the series. Debutants Yastika Bhatia, Richa Ghosh and Meghana Singh’s amazing performances, the mental strength that the team has shown Coming back to the 3rd match after such a heart-breaking loss in the second match.
But the area for them to work on will be their fielding and keeping, which needs significant improvements as we march towards the ODI world cup next year.
Paint it Pink
The next on the cards in the much-anticipated Pink Ball Test, to be played from the 30th September, 2021.
Where Australia, will be playing this format for the second time, it will be the very first time for India Women to play a day night test match. India being in a much better mental space will be looking forward to a positive outcome of the match as they face an injury ridden Australian side.
~Poulami Das (Stats Analyst, Beyond the Matches)
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