Australia's fielding sees them eclipse India in T20 Women’s semi

India kept coming, as they had to; Australia, weirdly faltered, nerves getting the better of them, they gave up extras and their usually reliable wicketkeeper Alyssa Healy, missed a couple of catches. 

And still Australia won their ICC T20 Women's World Cup semifinal at Newlands on Thursday.

They are not just a brilliant and powerful side, but a resourceful and resilient one too. Harmanpreet Kaur will bemoan the adjacent strip, and the damage thereof, which cost the Indian skipper her wicket and arrested India’s excellent run chase. 

It was a pulsating match, played in front of a sparse crowd, but one that created enough of an atmosphere to amp up the tension. 

Besides Kaur’s wicket, India will look at a poor fielding performance that gifted Australia crucial runs through dropped catches and mis-fields. Australia weren’t perfect in the field, but they produced moments of brilliance that ultimately won them the match. 

The margin of Australia’s victory was just five runs and so the small details here were crucial.

India’s bowling, especially Deepti Sharma, was excellent, they kept tight lines and forced Australia to hit straight. Occasionally they missed their lengths but had fielders in the right spots, cutting off the boundary options of the two Australian openers, Healy and Beth Mooney. 

Australia reached 43/0 in the power play, a more than adequate score, but given the manner in which they play, a figure that may have disappointed them especially as they only hit five boundaries in that period. 

India’s fielders, however, didn’t back up that bowling. Far too many balls were either missed or deflected and the throwing from the boundary was poor. That would be a key factor, given how Australia performed in that department later. 

Then there were the two dropped catches. First Mooney was missed when she had 32, a simple chance to Shafali Verma on the long-on boundary in the ninth over. In the next over, Meg Lanning, the Australia captain, got a thick edge to Radha Yadav that wicketkeeper Richa Ghosh grassed as well.

Lanning had 1 at the time. In the last over she blasted two sixes into the stands and finished on 49 not out. 

Mooney went on to make 54, before eventually being caught by Verma, whose furious celebration told of her own frustration about her costly miss earlier. 

India then played in the manner they have stated they want to do. Never mind the loss of the two openers; Verma and Smriti Mandhana, the rest of the batters, led by a precocious knock from Jemima Rodrigues, just kept hitting boundaries.

Rodrigues relished showing off her cover drive, both on the ground and in the air, striking the appropriate poses after each shot. She and Kaur shared a stand of 69 for the fourth wicket with the pressure they created forcing the Australians to concede nine wides and two no balls.

Then there were Healy’s misses which gave Kaur, two lives. The first was a conventional catch, which the Australian keeper misjudged, while the second was the result of a thin edge, which, given the high standards she has set, she’d normally take in her sleep. 

Rodrigues was dismissed trying to ramp the impressive Darcie Brown, with Healy managing to hold onto the ball. The 22-year-old’s innings of 43 came off just 24 balls and included six fours. 

Kaur kept going, registering a 10th T20 half-century before terrible misfortune struck her. She followed all the rules in attempting to slide her bat into the crease but the wear and tear on the adjacent strip saw it get stuck with a gleeful Healy breaking the stumps with the Indian captain 15cm short of her ground. She hurled her bat away in anger as she walked off the ground. 

Still, through Sharma, India kept coming. She ensured India needed 20 off 12 balls which is when Jess Jonassen, who played just one match previously in the tournament, delivered a crafty penultimate over, with straight lines and a full length forcing India’s batters to hit to the legside.

Ellye Perry produced a moment of magic with a full-length dive on the fine leg boundary to stop four before Jonassen bowled Sneh Rana.

It was another painful exit for India, who came up short in the last World Cup, also against Australia and then to the same opponents in the Commonwealth Games final last year. 

Australia marched on to their seventh final in a row.