Indian women were at the top of their game during the 3rd ODI against Australia women at Mackay, as they won the match by 2 wickets and broke the hosts 26-ODI winning streak as well, despite losing the series 1-2.
Australia women batted first after captain Meg Lanning won the toss and thanks to half-centuries from Beth Mooney and Ashleigh Gardner, put on 264/9 on the board. For India, Jhulan Goswami and Pooja Vastrakar picked three wickets each.
In reply, Shafali Verma and Yastika Bhatia made fifties, while Deepti Sharma’s 31 and Sneh Rana’s 30 were enough to push India over the finishing line with 2 wickets in hand and 3 balls to spare. Jhulan Goswami was also named Player of the Match.
"We are just happy that we have won the last game, just told the girls that we need to put up an A-grade performance, so happy with the victory. It's good to have a little bit of depth in the batting order, we tried the combinations with all-rounders and it worked. Pooja got runs and crucial wickets, Shafali was good and Sneh Rana did really well," Mithali said after the game.
"It was important to bounce back from the second match, that loss hurt us, it was good to chase, we are good in that, but I think the last game gave us confidence going into today's encounter," she added.
India needed 4 runs from the final over to register a win and Jhulan Goswami (8*) showed her experience to finally take the visitors over the line.
"We were just trying to win the game, try to stay there and finish the game. We lost the last match by a narrow margin, but today was a new day, I wanted to keep the ball in the right area and if I did that, I knew I could get breakthroughs. That was what I did. It's important to give your best in the field, take positives and that's what I want to do as a senior. Lots of aches in my body, need time to recover, but we're looking forward to be a part of the pink-ball Test," said Jhulan.
Both India and Australia will now lock horns in the pink-ball Test, beginning Thursday.
(ANI inputs)
