Nicole Bolton (84), Ellyse Perry (70) and Beth Mooney’s (56) half-century helped Australia score 287 runs for 9 wickets in their allotted 50 overs in the second ODI of the three-match series at Reliance Stadium, Vadodara on Thursday.
After thrashing Indian women squad by eight wickets with 18 overs to spare in the first ODI, Meg Lanning and her girls were high on confidence and propelled by Nicole Bolton’s 84 runs knock, which included 12 boundaries, they managed to set a daunting target (288 to win) before the Indian team.
Earlier after winning the toss, Indian skipper Mithali Raj opted to bowl first. The hosts somehow managed to succeed in their plan, as they managed to take opener Alyssa Healy’s wicket (19 runs off 37 balls) early.
Following Alyssa’s dismissal, Aussie skipper Lanning took the charge of Australian innings along with Bolton. But even Lanning was not able to add much to the Aussie scoreboard as the captain gifted her wicket to Shikha Pandey for 24 runs, and soon Nicole Bolton and Rachael Haynes followed.
After three back – back wickets, Ellyse Perry stabilised the Aussie innings with Beth Mooney and added 96 runs for the sixth wicket.
However, Shikha Pandey broke their partnership by sending Mooney back to the pavilion. After Mooney’s departure, Ashleigh Gardner joined Perry at the crease.
Ashleigh Gardner was sent back to the pavilion by Poonam Yadav at the score of 6 runs.
Meanwhile, Shikha Pandey(3) and Poonam Yadav (2) stooped Australian batting attack by taking five wickets.
Harmanpreet Kaur and Ekta Bisht took one wicket each.
Fall of wickets:
54-1 (Alyssa Healy, 12.5), 130-2 (Meg Lanning, 26.3), 143-3 (Nicole Bolton, 29.4), 144-4 (Rachael Haynes, 30.3), 240-5 (Beth Mooney, 44.3), 248-6 (Ashleigh Gardner, 46.1), 273-7 (Nicola Carey, 48.5), 285-8 (Jess Jonassen, 49.4)
India Women Playing XI: Punam Raut, Smriti Mandhana, Mithali Raj (c), Harmanpreet Kaur, Deepti Sharma, Veda Krishnamurthy, Sushma Verma (wk), Shikha Pandey, Pooja Vastrakar, Poonam Yadav, Ekta Bisht.
Australia Women Playing XI: Nicole Bolton, Alyssa Healy (wk), Meg Lanning (c), Ellyse Perry, Beth Mooney, Rachael Haynes, Ashleigh Gardner, Nicola Carey, Jess Jonassen, Amanda Wellington, Megan Schutt