272/5 (45.2)
CR : 6.00
271/5 (50.0)
CR : 5.42
Australia Women won by 5 wickets 🏆
Player of the Match
Meg Lanning
135(130)
45.1
0
A Khaka to A Sutherland
Fuller delivery on the stumps, Sutherland drives it straight to mid on.
45.2
1
A Khaka to A Sutherland
That's the end of the game. Khaka bowls it full down leg, Sutherland flicks it towards fine leg for a single to complete a comprehensive win over South Africa. With this, the Australian Women make it six in six and stay at the top of the table and hand South Africa its first loss of the competition.
AUSW won by 5 wickets
And Australia continue to dominate the Women's Cricket World Cup 2022. Lanning and Co register their sixth win of the tournament to stay unbeaten and retain the top spot on the points table. Apart from the first couple of wickets, South Africa could never put any sort of pressure on the women from down under. Skipper Lanning led from the front with a scintillating 135 off 130 to see her team over the line. All of Beth Mooney, Tahlia McGrath, Ashleigh Gardner, and Annabel Sutherland contributed to the chase.
Apart from Shabnim Ismail, no other bowler looked threatening from the South African lineup. Australia exploited the voids in the opposition's bowling and cruised towards their target. While South Africa are still going to make it to the semi-finals, they looked dejected with their performance today, which shows how hungry they are to perform well. Several dropped catches and some poor fielding efforts throughout the second innings cost them the game.
Meg Lanning is the Player of the Match for her match-winning knock of 135* off 130 balls.
Meg Lanning | Player of the Match: “Was nice to contribute. We talk a lot about our top four playing through the innings and finishing things off. They bowled well early in the innings and I left a lot of balls in my innings. Ismail bowled nicely in the second spell and picked up a wicket and shifted the momentum towards them. I was very clear with my plans and happy to contribute to the team’s success. I always try to bat through and the batters coming after me took the pressure off me. Mooney and McGrath played very well from the other end. No. 3 is a crucial position in any team and I try to score as many runs as I could and help win games for my side."
Sune Luus | Losing Captain: "I think we had great first innings, the batters batted well and 270 was par. I thought Meg was great and we bowled both sides of the field. On another day, we would have defended it, but couldn't do it. That's the trick playing the Aussies, you do not know what is a good total on this pitch against them. Those dropped catches did hurt us, we never do that and I think it is a loss of focus from our end, we will have a chat about it later on. Ismail has been phenomenal for us and that spell proved it to us. I think the spinners need to buck up and we hope we will be able to overcome this hiccup. We have two games to spare. Our next game is in a day's time against Bangladesh, so we have a day's time to prepare for it. We are looking forward to it and are confident of bouncing back in our next game. "
Meg Lanning | Winning Captain: "We thought it was a par score and the wicket was getting better as the game progressed. We thought we could chase it as the sun bettered the wicket. While we could not get some quick wickets, we kept them to a gettable score. I don't have an exact update on Perry. Hopefully, there's nothing serious. We gave a bit too many chances during the chase, which we need to work on. We would like to keep winning."
That's the end of the proceedings from this fixture. Do join us for the upcoming games as we bring you ball-by-ball updates throughout the tournament. Until then, it's goodbye from me, Ajay, and my fellow commentators Akshay and Ayan!