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Live Score IND vs AUS ICC Women’s World Cup Latest Updates: Australia skipper Meg Lanning won the toss and opted to bowl first hoping to get the benefit of conditions as it was raining in the morning. India captain Mithali Raj said she should have also bowled first. Both the teams have made one change each to their playing XIs.
Match Preview
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of India Women vs Australia Women World Cup group stage match from Eden Park, Auckland. After an inconsistent start to the tournament, the Women in Blue face a tough challenge in front of them in mighty Australia who are unbeaten in the tournament so far.
The Mithali Raj-led side have matches against Pakistan and Australia comprehensively but they suffered crushing defeats to New Zealand and England in the group stage so far.
In all four matches, their batting has oscillated between very high and low extremes. Amidst their inconsistent campaign, India now square off against six-time World Cup winners, Australia, who are on a consistent, undefeated run in the tournament, at Eden Park on Saturday.
It will also be the first time the two teams will meet in a 50-over World Cup match since the semifinal of the 2017 edition at Derby, where Harmanpreet Kaur’s whirlwind 171 served as the knockout punch for Australia.
A win against Australia would set India’s campaign on track to reach the semifinals as they face Bangladesh and South Africa afterwards. In the run-up to the World Cup, India’s batting looked stronger than their bowling in the bilateral series against New Zealand.
But in the mega event, the tables have turned with bowling looking strong while the batting has emerged with weak links.
For now, the Mithali Raj-led side has to ensure that the up-and-down batting performances and losing wickets in a heap has to be avoided against an Australia bowling attack which has bowled out New Zealand and West Indies for 128 and 131 respectively in its last two matches.
Collapses of 114/6, 95/5, 78/3 and 86/7 convey that in both victory and defeat, India have been hampered by this nagging issue, acknowledged by Smriti Mandhana in her pre-match briefing.
Left-handed Mandhana, India’s leading run-getter so far in the tournament with 216 runs, thinks stitching partnerships will be a key in solving the collapse problem.
If India are able to avoid the wobble in top and middle order, then they will need runs collectively from the batting order. Mandhana and Harmanpreet Kaur have been among the runs but the same can’t be said of Mithali Raj and Deepti Sharma.
Mithali moved up to three from four while Deepti took her captain’s place but the duo haven’t got the runs in four matches. It remains to be seen if an out-of-form Shafali Verma will come in or India will stick with left-handed Yastika Bhatia.
On the other hand, Australia have got very little to worry about. Rachael Haynes is in brilliant form, leading the run-scoring charts with 277 runs. Alyssa Healy and Meg Lanning will be looking to be more consistent while Ellyse Perry, Ashleigh Gardner, Tahlia McGrath and Beth Mooney have clicked well.
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