Smriti Mandhana steers India to a remarkable win against Australia as the hosts level series

Navi Mumbai stayed witness to history as a bunch of fearless women donning the Indian jersey stunned Australia in a fierce thriller that went down to the very wire. A Smriti Mandhana masterclass accompanied by another Richa Ghosh blitzkrieg towards the end left the visitors reeling before the Women in Blue successfully staved away the Australian challenge in the super over to restore parity in the 5-match T20I series.

In a paradigm-shifting spectacle, Navi Mumbai found itself to be choc-a-bloc and that too in a women’s game, a rare sighting that will go down in history. The Indian women were not willing to return them empty-handed either as their batters posted a phenomenal show of resilience and eventually fired on the big occasion, bringing down Australians in a stunning Super Over.

The Indian bowlers couldn’t drum up anything significant as Australia started on a blinding note, thanks to some early pyrotechnics from Alyssa Healy, to announce the intentions of the visitors. Despite Deepti Sharma managing to scalp the former, the Australian cascade of runs didn’t stall as Tahlia McGrath and Beth Mooney rained boundaries upon the Indian bowlers.

Deepti Sharma was the star of the lot with figures of 4-0-31-1 on a night where the other bowlers took quite a hammering while Beth Mooney’s 84 laced with Tahlia McGrath’s 70 catapulted the visitors to a staggering 187, leaving an exceptionally vertiginous mountain to scale for the Indians.

Irrespective of the insurmountable challenges on the way, Team India was not willing to sit back as Smriti Mandhana brought out the big guns straight away while Shafali Verma held fort at the other end. The two openers fired India to a sizzling start and the Women in Blue seemed firmly in control with a bit of an extended hand from Lady Luck after Shafali Verma was granted a life midway in her innings.

Despite a resonating start from the Indian openers, Australia managed to throw a temporary spanner in the mix as they bagged Shafali Verma and Jemimah Rodriguez in quick succession. However, the Indian captain arrived in the middle and settled down the frayed nerves as Mandhana kept on hacking away.

India seemed firmly in control till the visitors managed to seize Harmanpreet Kaur and Smriti Mandhana in quick succession. Unlike India’s woes before, Richa Ghosh took up the mantle on herself and came out all guns blazing as she smoked the Australian bowlers beyond the ropes effortlessly. Despite the fears of a late slump after Deepti Sharma holed out to Alana King, it was a priceless knock under the pump from Devika Vaidya who hammered a last-ball boundary to drag the contest to a Super Over.

Richa Ghosh and Smriti Mandhana were once again bang on their money as the Women in Blue posted a momentous 20 runs on the board while it was Renuka Singh Thakur who administered the coup de grace with a phenomenal over that took away the game from Australia, slowly but steadily.