The scenes at the end of the match were telling. Immediately after Heather Knight sealed a comfortable eight-wicket win for England, India captain Mithali Raj called for a huddle before the players walked off the ground.
It’s difficult to know what was said, but it’s fair to assume it cannot have been anything flattering about the performance of the day. The captain knew she had to rally the troops because there was very little to be happy about.
The India women’s team produced a listless performance with the bat as England capitalised to level the three-match series 1-1 to take the series into the decider on April 12.
England spinners Danielle Hazell (4/32) and Sophie Ecclestone (4/14) returned with four wickets each to dismiss India for a paltry 113 in 37.2 overs. That should hurt more considering the hosts won the toss and elected to bat.
Smriti Mandhana (42) and Deepti Sharma (26) were the top scorers for India as five batters scored in single digits while two of them were out for naught.
India had won the opening match by one wicket, in what turned out to be a thriller. But, despite the win, familiar problems were exposed, the over-reliance on Mandhana the most telling of them all. It was not any different in the second ODI either.
Batting woes
Raj and Harmanpreet Kaur’s indifferent form has only complicated matters. Their dismissals on Monday were contrasting in nature.
Raj received an absolute peach from Hazelle, as the ball pitched just outside the off-stump, turned in sharply and through the gap between bat and bap. The stumps were disturbed and so, it seemed, was India’s psyche. Raj’s stunned reaction, where she stood still at the crease for a few minutes, not sure what had just happened.
In Hazelle’s next over, she followed that dream off-spinner’s delivery with a rank full toss, which Kaur hit straight to mid-on.
Once Hazelle removed three wickets in the space of two overs, it was pretty much downhill for the Indian batting lineup. Losing six wickets for 70 run at one point, crossing 100 thanks only to some application from Deepti Sharma.
Chasing 114 for a win, England never looked like in trouble as Danielle Wyatt (47) and Tammy Beaumont (39) shared a 73-run opening stand to take the game away from India. Wyatt scored five boundaries and two sixes in her 43-ball innings, while Beaumont hit three fours during her patient knock.
After left-arm spinner Ekta Bisht dismissed Wyatt and first-down Amy Jones (0), Heather Knight then took the team home with an unbeaten 26 off 42 balls as England scored 117 in 29 overs to level the series.
“I thought today will be a better wicket [than the first match], when I saw it was rolled out at toss. I was a bit surprised yes [by the amount of turn it took],” Raj said after the match. “When you have a long season, natural to get fatigued. The girls do try hard, we are unfortunately unable to get the middle order sorted. We’ll try and put up our best show in the third game.”
Brief Score: India: 113 in 37.2 overs (Mandhana 42; Sophie Ecclestone 4/14) lost to England: 117 in 29 overs (Wyatt 47; Bisht 2/44).
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