The Indian women's team is looking at the T20I series, including hosts Australia and England, as the ideal preparatory ground for the World Cup that kickstarts next month. It is in this tournament, says opener Smriti Mandhana, that the Harmanpreet Kaur-led side will be hoping to finalise its strategies and team composition for the big event down under. 

"Most of them have played in Australia, I think India A touring Australia last month is also going to be a big help (as) four-five players were part of that team as well," Mandhana told reporters ahead of the seven-match-long tri-series that begins on January 31, three weeks before India's World Cup campaign rolls on with the opening day Group A encounter against Australia on February 21. 

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"The tri-series is going to be a really important tournament, thinking about the team composition or what is needed or what target we need to aim at on Australian wickets," she added. 

India will also take on Bangladesh (February 24), New Zealand (February 27) and Sri Lanka (February 29) before the knock-outs. 

"How can our bowlers plan better, all those things we are going to understand once we land in Australia and play the tri-series," Mandhana said. "Specially the targets, tri-series will define the targets, like what the scoreline will be for the World Cup."

"England, Australia and India is always going (to be challenging). We are going to aim at good targets so I think that (tri-series) is an important tournament leading up to the World Cup."

The 23-year-old says this young Indian side has been thinking about the T20 World Cup for the last one year. "Whatever we were doing during the matches, we were thinking about the World Cup, so finally we are leaving for the World Cup, it is quite exciting," Mandhana said. 

"I'm looking forward to playing this World Cup with this team as it is a new team with a mixture of experienced and new players."

(Inputs from PTI)