India vs Australia, 1st ODI: Mithali Raj completes 20000 career runs
India women’s captain Mithali Raj has reached another milestone by scoring her fifth consecutive ODI fifty and completing 20,000 career runs in the process against the Australian women in the first ODI.
Mithali had earlier scored 75, 59 and 72 against England while a 79 came against South Africa in her last four international outings as India captain.
Skipper Mithali Raj (61 of 107) recorded her fifth consecutive fifty, which was also her 59th overall half-century, while the other significant contributions came from debutants Yastika Bhatia (35 off 51) and Richa Ghosh (32 not out off 29).
India’s batting woes continued as they could only manage 225/8 against Australia in the first women’s ODI of the three-match series on Tuesday.
India, who are aiming to score 250 plus consistently to challenge the likes of Australia, kept losing wickets regularly in an innings that never got the momentum it needed.
India would not have crossed the 220-run mark if it wasn’t for the eight-wicket stand of 45 runs between senior pacer Jhulan Goswami (20 off 24) and Ghosh, who was picked ahead of Taniya Bhatia to add the much-needed firepower to the batting line-up.
India openers Shafali Verma (8) and Smriti Mandhana (16), whom the team relies on heavily for brisk starts, perished after hitting a few boundaries. Senior batter Harmanpreet Kaur did not play the game due to a thumb injury.
Pacer Darcie Brown (4/33) picked up four wickets for Australia while debutant Hannah Darlington (2/29) and Sophie Molineux (2/39) took a couple each.
