smiriti
Cricket

“As a batting unit team, we would love to work on our first innings game,” says Smriti Mandhana after the 2nd T20I win against Australia

The Indian women’s cricket team stunned Australia with a superover triumph in the second T20I at the Dy Patil Stadium on Sunday. Seeking 188 to win, India brought the game to the Super Over, winning by four runs and tying the series 1-1 in a five-match T20I series. Smriti Mandhana and Shafali Varma’s 76-run opening partnership off 52 balls created the winning platform. She did, however, consider it was the most matured opening partnership she’d had with Shafali.

The Indian vice captain remarked during the post-match press conference: “What other option do we have but to go bang-bang in a 185-run chase.”

Shafali Verma partnered perfectly with Mandhana and performed some crucial strokes that aided Team India build a flawless partnership, cruising on which the Women in Blue were able to tie the contest in the regulation 20 overs while claiming a stunning win in the Super Over, thanks to another significant performance from the Indian vice-captain.

Mandhana, who slammed a 49-ball 79 in India’s run chase, credited the lower middle order batsmen’ effort for taking the game to the Super Over.

“We hadn’t imagined that we will have a super over tonight, and in the Super Over – with the likes of Richa and Shafali – I would go out to bat. I am a believer of visualisation, but I hadn’t thought about this. I was pretty blank. Had nothing in my mind,” Mandhana explained.

“When I hit the first six, I was very excited and pumped up. I’m not the kind of person people can understand from the outside as to what’s going on in my head. But when I hit the first six, I was like ‘wow’, it was massive. After that when Richa Ghosh got out, me and Harman decided that we will try to hit boundaries and not a six. If we would’ve got out, it would’ve been over. We had to try and hit boundaries. The six I did hit, I was trying to hit a boundary. I was really, really blank,” she also added.

Nevertheless, Team India has come close numerous times in previous years against Australia, but have come up short on more instances than they would have wanted. Mandhana also feels that this victory would strengthen the team’s morale.

“When we are chasing, we do have a lot of calculations. As a batting unit team, we would love to work on our first innings game a little more and be a little more calculative. It’s not the easiest thing to do. Everyone in world cricket struggles in the first innings of T20. But definitely as a team, we need to improve that. Australia is an amazing team. They have been very consistent with the kind of batting line up and fielding they have. But we got back ourselves to go out there and beat them,” she concluded.

The Indian women’s team will face Australia for the rest of the series, which will be followed by a tri-series versus the West Indies and South Africa immediately before the T20 World Cup.

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