With all the roads leading to the Women's T20 World Cup in Australia, defending champions Australia defeated the Indian Women by 11 runs in the finals of the Women's T20 Tri-series.
Australian team captain won the toss at the Junction Oval in Melbourne and decided to bat first. The Indian team were confident of their chances after defeating the same Australian team 3 days ago courtesy a great innings by the 15 year old Shafali Verma.
Australia started of cautiously as they scored 35 in the first six overs losing the prized wicket of Alyssa Healy in the first over itself. There was a good partnership between Opener Beth Mooney and Asleigh Gardner and then between Meg Lanning and Mooney.
There was a late surge by Rachel Haynes which helped Australia reach a total of 155 , which is considered to be a tight total in the finals.
Indian openers Shafali Verma and Smriti Mandhana tried playing cautiously but Verma eventually fell to Vlaeminckin the 2nd over . Smriti Mandhana continued to bat with flare and aggression to help India reach the target given by the Australians but kept losing partners after Smriti Mandhana fel in the 15th Over soon fell the wicket of Harmanpreet Kaur and Arundhati Reddy which put pressure on the Indian players.
Tanya Bhatia fought till the end to keep the runs coming but eventually she also fell and India were fell short of the target by 11 runs.
Jess Jonassen was awarded the Player of the Match for her five wickets haul and Beth Mooney was awarded the Player of the Tournament for her performance in the tournament with the bat.