Australia put on an authoritative show at the Newlands Cricket Stadium on Thursday as they crushed India by 5 runs to book their seats in the final of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2023. India were hence denied yet another opportunity to make the finals of an ICC event since the 2020 Women’s World T20. Harmanpreet Kaur, who led the side a day after being down with fever, was left teary-eyed after the side crashed out while being consoled by former captain Anjum Chopra.
Australian openers Alyssal Healy and Beth Mooney played in top-class fashion, their pyrotechnics leaving Indian attack clueless, as they stitched a record 172-run stand to put Indian batting order to the test. In response, India’s top-three struggled considerably on the Newlands pitch despite Kaur netting a blistering half-century. Jemimah Rodrigues’ quickfire 43 provided some respite for India, but was never quite enough to ensure India a ticket to the final.
Also Read: Women`s T20 World Cup: Harmanpreet Kaur stuck, India out of luck!
After the defeat, the cameras panned toward the Indian captain, where a distraught Harmanpreet was spotted sitting all by herself, trying to resist tears. Such was the emotional outpouring that she turned up for the post-match presentation ceremony in glasses, in a bid to hide her tears. Moments later, the right-handed batter struggled to hold back tears just when Chopra walked towards her and hugged, even as Harleen Deol wiped tears from her (Kaur’s) eyes.
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“I don’t want my country to see me crying, hence I am wearing these glasses, I promise, we will improve and won’t let our nation down like this again,” Kaur was quoted as saying in the post-match presentation. “The way I got runout, can`t be unluckier than that. Putting in the effort was more important. We discussed fighting till the last ball. The result didn`t go our way, but I am happy with the way we played in this tournament. We know we have a good batting line up even if we lose early wickets. Need to give credit to Jemi for the way she batted today. She got us the momentum we were looking for.”
Thursday night could have been remembered in a different way had India won. Kaur & Co. were inches away from etching their names in history. As wickets kept falling like a pack of cards, Harmanpreet seemed to be in a zone of her own, netting a sublime 52 off just 34 balls, laced with six boundaries and one maximum.
She looked like a ‘Woman on a Mission’ wearing the camouflage army cap for the better part of her half-century but that wasn`t enough to prevent India from losing the semi-final. She did her best to keep Australia on their toes and then the unthinkable happened. In what panned out to be a major turnaround, Kaur was adjudged run-out while returning for her second run in the 15th over as he bat appeared to be stuck only inches before the mark.
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