Perth: After her knock of 105 went in vain as India lost the third ODI to Australia by 83 runs to be clean swept 3-0, vice-captain Smriti Mandhana admitted India are not yet a finished product as a fielding side.
India were sloppy in their fielding display throughout the series and in Wednesday’s game at the WACA Ground, they dropped Annabel Sutherland twice, who went on to slam a brilliant 110 and posted 298/6. In reply, barring Smriti’s ninth ODI ton, none of the Indian batters supported her as they were bowled out for 215 in 45.1 overs.
“Fielding is an aspect which is a work in progress for us for the last one and a half to two years. We’ve definitely improved quite a lot, but we are not still a finished product in the fielding unit.”
“So day in, and day out we need to put the hard yards in and get the team sorted in terms of the fielding. We all know that we all want to learn and accept our mistakes, which is a great thing about this team. So we’ll take these things in our stride and try and rectify our mistakes,” said Smriti in the post-match press conference.
India came into Australia after beating New Zealand 2-1 in ODIs in Ahmedabad in October, but couldn’t win a single game on their trip. “Definitely tough to take because we came here (after) winning the New Zealand series and really felt that the team was looking good.”
“But definitely got outplayed by Australia, especially in the second and third match. There were days when our batting clicked and days when our bowling clicked, but we as a team couldn’t click together. A lot of learnings to take and hopefully we keep working on them,” added Smriti.
She also brushed aside queries that India doubt their abilities to compete against Australia in international cricket. “We definitely don’t doubt that we can’t compete. You can’t play a game of cricket if you doubt yourself so not that the belief only came today. When we even got them five down in the first match, the belief was always there.”
“I’m sure that there are things which didn’t go our way – like there was a time in this game where we could have taken those chances and maybe the result would have been different. It’s a learning for us about taking all those chances when given and we’ve never doubted our belief system.”
With Shafali Verma left out, Smriti had a new opening partner in Priya Punia, before Richa Ghosh filled in for the last two games. Priya’s left knee injury in the second ODI meant India were forced to promote Richa to the top of the order, which meant they had no firepower in the middle order.
“That’s a call which will be taken maybe once we get back home, but last match was a really unfortunate injury for Priya Punia and we didn’t have a choice – we were chasing 380 and Richa is the most attacking batter we have in our batting line up,” she said. “If she gets going, she can take the game on and away from any team. So that was the plan last match and the unfortunate injury from Priya made us change these things. But we’ll definitely have a review about it and see what we can do the best,” she added.
With the ball, seam-bowling all-rounder Arundhati Reddy led the initial Indian fightback by extracting seam movement in her first spell of eight overs, which saw her take out Georgia Voll, Phoebe Litchfield, Ellyse Perry and Beth Mooney to pick a career-best 4-27.
“I was just told to pick wickets, but I mean it was a good outing for me personally. The plan was just to pick and keep looking for wickets. I didn’t play the first two games, so it gave me a little time to understand the Australian batters plan accordingly,” she said.
Arundhati could have got her fifth wicket, but Ashleigh Gardner was dropped by Jemimah Rodrigues, and then survived an lbw decision, as it was changed on review. “I was trying too hard to get the fifer, but again it’s part of the game. I was a bit unlucky in the review not going our way, so it’s okay.”
“It would have been better if the team had won – wickets only matter when doing well and the team wins. So unfortunately we couldn’t – but it gives me a lot of confidence. Again I will always look forward to playing against them, as they are one of the best teams and I have always looked forward to playing against them. But taking the wicket of Ellyse Perry was so satisfying,” she concluded.
(IANS)
