All-rounder Gardner shines in India

It is not easy to stand out in the current Australian women’s team, packed as it is with matchwinners and superstars, but as their tour of India drew to a successful close Ash Gardner managed it.

The 25-year-old from Bankstown won back-to-back player of the match awards to be named player of the series, a high accolade considering Ellyse Perry hit successive seventies on her return to the team and Beth Mooney a pair of eighties.

But, after a slow start, Gardner shone in every aspect. Denied the chance to come to the crease in the opening two matches she was stumped for seven trying to force it in the third.

But in the final two games she made 42 off 27 balls to turbo-charge an innings that had been merely ticking over, then on Tuesday an unbeaten 66 off 32 in a match-winning 12-an-over partnership with Grace Harris that wrapped up the 4-1 series victory.

With the ball, her offspinners earned 7-128 in 18 overs, which is creditable, but the key element is – as with her batting, when she took advice from Perry, to ‘hit through the ball’ – she learned.

Having taken 1-67 off seven overs in the opening two games, she finished with 6-61 off 11 in the final three.

“As a bowler, it’s about having clear plans about what you need to execute,” she said.

“If that goes wrong, that’s OK, and batters will have to hit good shots. But you have to be clear on what your plan is.”

Her success in Mumbai followed an outstanding WBBL campaign in which she was named player of the tournament having scored 339 runs at a strike-rate of 153.39 in the regular campaign and taken 23 wickets.

Unfortunately, in a reminder that cricket can be a capricious game, in the final she made a four-ball duck and went wicketless as her Sydney Sixers lost to the Adelaide Strikers.

But this standard-bearer for Aboriginal women’s cricketers has bounced back in India and says she is, “Just enjoying my cricket more than anything else, reaping the benefits on the field”.

The team only have eyes for the Twenty20 World Cup at present – in less than eight weeks they will begin their defence against New Zealand in South Africa.

But others are looking beyond that event, to the first edition of the women’s Indian Premier League, which is due to launch in March.

A multiple-World Cup-winning all-rounder, who has shown she learns fast on Indian wickets, will be in demand.

Gardner first went to India as the 18-year-old captain of the Australia Indigenous team. She is likely to have the opportunity to return plenty more times.