India women’s team suffered yet another heartbreak as they fell agonizingly short of the target in the gold medal match against Australia at the CWG 2022 in Edgbaston on August 7, 2022. India lost the final by 9 runs and ended up having to be satisfied with the silver medal.
Australia proved to be their nemesis yet again while a pattern followed the Girls in Blue as they lost a bucket of wickets in a tight chase to lose the match from a comfortable position.
Meg Lanning of Australia won the toss and chose to bat first. A bit of controversy happened as all-rounder Tahlia McGrath was allowed to play the match despite testing positive for Covid-19 ahead of the game.
Beth Mooney led from the front with 61, while Lanning made 36 and Ashleigh Gardner made 25 runs with Australia making 161/8 in 20 overs. Renuka Singh and Sneh Rana picked two wickets each.
In the chase, India suffered early as Smriti Mandhana (6) and Shafali Verma (11) fell early. But then Jemimah Rodrigues and Harmanpreet Kaur added a record 96 runs for the third wicket. Harmanpreet Kaur made a well-complied fifty as well.
But Rodrigues lost her composure and was bowled by Megan Schutt for 33 runs, which opened a gate for wickets to fall. Harmanpreet followed next for 65 in 43 balls with 7 fours and 2 sixes and with her, India’s hopes of a gold medal also went back.
Ashleigh Gardner (3/16) and Schutt (2/27) tightened the screws and despite India closing in on the required run rate, lost wickets at regular intervals to be bowled out for 152, losing their last 8 wickets for just 34 runs. The three runouts didn’t help either as India crumbled to yet another loss to the Southern Stars.
India lost the gold medal match by 9 runs to Australia and had to be content with the silver medal. Australia won the gold medal, adding a new feather in their cap given that they are already the 50-over world champions and the 20-over world champions.
Meanwhile, the cricket fraternity on Twitter lauded the effort of the Indian women’s team and praised them wholeheartedly for their silver medal win.
Here are the tweets:
