It was the final delivery in the 2010 T20 World Cup final in Bridgetown, May 2016. Ellyse Perry had to defend five runs for a win, four would have led to a tie. Sophie Devine struck the full length delivery as hard as she possibly could. In the moment when the contact was made between bat and ball, the destiny was for it to reach the boundary ropes. Surely. But Perry, a good footballer who would soon go on to play at the Fifa Women’s World Cup for Australia, had other ideas. She stuck her boot out instinctively and it deflected towards mid-on. She would be player of the match for her 3/18 but even that one instance, would have justified that award.
It wasn’t the final delivery of the final in the 2023 T20 World Cup semifinal in Cape Town, February 2023. But Australia were under pressure when Sneh Rana made contact with a sweep shot off Jess Jonassen. It was timed pretty well. In the moment when the contact was made between bat and ball, once again the destiny was for it to reach the boundary ropes. But Perry, now 32 years old, ran from deep square leg, bent down with all the momentum she had, and almost played the perfect cover drive with her bare hands while putting in a full length dive. She didn’t just stop the ball, she already knew what she was doing: pushing the ball towards the fielder in the vicinity. She saved a four, she also desperately wanted to save a three.
Thirteen years apart, two moments of athletic brilliance in the grandest of stages, the tensest of situations. And Perry was out in the middle, showing the world what an elite professional she was, is and, will remain.
In Cape Town on Thursday, it was also perhaps summed up where the biggest difference was between the two teams. Maybe it would be a bit much to say that was the moment Australia won the game (14 off 8 balls was still going to be tough for India). But it certainly helped the defending champions put the finishing touch on a brilliant comeback, personifying a never-say-die attitude on the field and a belief that 100% effort for every delivery adds up in the end.
In sharp contrast, India’s fielding was largely listless on the day, except for a few dives here and there. They missed balls hit straight at them, catches were put down, stumping opportunities missed and so on. India’s fielding performance on the day has been summed up here in our post-match feature but fair to say, they leaked more runs than what they saved.
For Harmanpreet Kaur, it must be especially frustrating to see. She had spoken in a recent interview with Scroll about how fielding is actually her personal happy space and that if she could see something change as the leader of this team, it was an improvement in their fielding department.
“If you have a great fielding side, you can win any game. One day I want to see that the Indian side is the best fielding side in the world,” she had said.
That day wasn’t Thursday. The captain herself has always prided on being sharp in the field. Former captain Anjum Chopra mentioned in this emotional post-match video how Kaur was running around the ground despite not being well in the lead-up to the game. Indeed, if one could take a step back and look at the bigger picture, the Indian U19 women’s team was sensational in the field in the recent World Cup final, earning the praise of the opposition for how they made an impact by throwing themselves around, taking sharp catches and saving runs. The future, perhaps, is bright.
But the senior team has struggled on the field for a while now, and despite acknowledging that this is an area they all want to improve, the results are not quite there yet consistently.
This isn’t to point fingers at them for a lack of effort. In the pre-match video for ICC, Ian Bishop briefly showed us how India were focussing on getting things right on the field but under the spotlight, it is a skill area that continues to cause more concern than joy for this team.
As for Australia, they didn’t have the perfect day on the field either. Everyone can make mistakes, but the best sides look to maximise what is under their control. After a couple of mishaps that could have potentially cost them the game too, Australia were sensational in the last few overs and no one better than the legendary Perry, who continues to set the benchmark, years later.
“I think we showed our class today in the field and we always speak about as a group being the best fielding team in the world, and I think today really showed that,” player of the match Ash Gardner said in the press conference.
“Elyse Perry was elite on the boundary. She probably saved six runs herself. So, to think whether it’s drop catches, missed opportunities in the field, those ultimately add up to quite a lot of runs. And I think we took those pivotal moments when we really needed to. And yeah, I certainly think Pez was probably the blueprint for our side going forward, certainly on the boundary, but I think, yeah, at the end of the day, that could have been something that I guess was the difference between us and them.”
Ashleigh Gardner on what helps Australia be a top fielding side:
We have KPIs and there’s markers that show us whether we’re positive or negative in the field. So that’s one thing that after a game, if we know that we’ve fielded badly, we could be minus 10. But if we’ve fielded really well, we’re plus six and we do it for both sides. So, there’s a pretty clear indication how we’re fielded, obviously it is subjective. But I think we just know how to push each other. In our training sessions, there are always really high-pressured situations. And I think us as athletes, we’re all really, we all push each other, whether it’s on the field or off the field, whether it’s in the gym, it’s running. I think our athletic ability is also one of the things that we’re probably at the higher end of nations around the world. And that’s something that we really pride ourselves on is being fit, being strong. And ultimately that’s one of the things that has an impact in the field.
— via ICC Online Media Zone, from the post-match press conference transcript
Conventional wisdom tends to overemphasise the importance of fielding in a cricket match. Catches win matches is a cliche that modern analysts of the game sometime don’t agree with, because it is too simplistic. But the impact of saving runs on the field is a skill in the modern game that can be controlled. And where India let themselves down, Perry’s moment of genius stood in sharp contrast.
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