New Delhi: The Australian Women's cricket team defeated India by 14 runs in the last match of the three-match T20 series. With this win, Australia have now won the T20 series 2-0 and India vs Australia multi-format series ends 11 points to 5 in favour of Australia.
Australia batted first and power-packed knocks from Beth Mooney (61) and Tahlia McGrath helped Australia make 149 runs for loss of five wickets. Chasing a decent target of 150 run for the win, Smriti Mandhana scored a half-century but her innings went in vain as India could only manage 135 runs for loss of 6 wickets in their allotted 20 overs.
The Indian team got off to a bad start as star opener Shefali Verma was sent back to the pavilion by Ashley Gardner for just 1 run. After this, Jemima Rodrigues (23) along with Mandhana added 57 runs for the second wicket.
Wareheim broke their partnership by dismissing Rodrigues. Harmanpreet Kaur was then expected to play a match-winning knock and bat till the very end but went on to score just 13 runs. Pooja Vastrakar, who was one of the top performers in India's last match, could also only 5 runs. Mandhana was departed by Nicola Carey after playing a brilliant innings of 52 runs off 49 balls.
Earlier, Indian captain Harmanpreet Kaur won the toss and asked Australia to bat first. The hosts' top-order fell like a pack of cards but Tahlia McGrath once again rescued her team with a 44 runs off 31 ball innings. Her knock including 6 fours and a six.