Twitter Reactions: Aggressive Australia win their fifth T20 World Cup title with a dominant win

Alyssa Healy and Mooney set the tone for Australia with the bat while the bowlers did their job perfectly defending a mammoth 184.

By Aditya Gajanan Kukalyekar verified

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Australia Women
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Australia Women. (Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)

The final of the Women’s T20 World Cup final was supposed to be record-breaking in terms of the crowd. And the fans didn’t disappoint as the MCG was jam-packed to support their favourite. But the contest in the middle wasn’t even close to anything expected. Australia were so dominant throughout that they didn’t give even an ounce of a chance to India. And Harmanpreet Kaur and her girls didn’t have any answer to the home side’s assault at any stage.

After winning the toss, Australia got off to a sensational start courtesy Alyssa Healy who literally got going from the word go. She took the attack to the Indian bowlers whoever bowled at her and left India stunned. Beth Mooney, at the other end, played some smart cricket rotating the strike and made sure that her partner got most of the strike in the powerplay.

Healy got to the half-century off just 30 balls which is the fastest in any ICC tournament final – Men’s or Women’s. The assault actually began in the middle overs when India would’ve hoped to stem the run flow. Healy stepped on the gas taking apart Shikha Pandey for 23 runs in a single over. However, when one thought that she will go on to notch up a historic ton, Radha Yadav got the better of her but not before score 75 off just 39 balls with seven fours and five sixes.

Mooney, meanwhile, was set at the other end and she took over the control of the innings in the second half. The southpaw continued her great form in the tournament and played through the innings to remain unbeaten on 78 off just 54 balls. India did come back towards the fag end of the innings but Australia managed to post a daunting total of 184 runs on the board after 20 overs.

An expected Smriti-Kaur assault which never came

India needed two of their experienced batters Smriti Mandhana and Harmanpreet Kaur to fire in the final. But the duo didn’t click when it mattered the most as the pressure got to them. While Mandhana scored only 11 runs, the Indian captain, on her birthday, mustered only four runs. The number 1 T20I batter Shafali Verma also got out in the first over which shattered India’s hopes in the powerplay itself.

At 30/4, India four best batters were back in the hut and the middle and lower-middle order which was anyways not known to hit big shots was left with too much to do. Australia came out with a perfect plan to each of the opposition batters and India just fell into the trap. The likes of Megan Schutt, Sophie Molineux, Jess Jonassen and Nicola Carey all played part in routing India.

After Kaur got out in the sixth over of the innings, it was never a contest in the game and India just crawled to 99 runs before getting bowled out in final over of the innings. To make things worse, Taniya Bhatia suffered concussion coming out to bat at three as Richa Ghosh replaced her to bat later.

Australia erupted in unison in front of the record crowd at the MCG as Ashleigh Gardner took a running catch to dismiss Poonam Yadav as they won the T20 World Cup for the fifth time in the history. While Schutt returned with the match-winning figures of 4/18, Jonassen picked three wickets as well. For India, meanwhile, it was yet another opportunity missed after the 2017 50-over World Cup final.

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