‘Keep working hard and keep it tight…..’ – Harmanpreet Kaur opens up on India women win over Australia women in 1st T20I

The India women’s team beat the Australia women’s team by nine wickets in the first T20I game on January 5 at DY Patil Sports Academy. Notably, the Harmanpreet Kaur-led side will be seen in action on January 7th, where they will be facing the Aussies for the second T20I game, and they will be looking to win the game to seal the series. India women have lost the ODI series by 3-0 against Australia, and they will be looking to win the T20I series after one off-test game.

Speaking about the game here, the Australian women could only pile up 141 runs before getting an all-out in 19.2 overs. However, the India women chased down the total with 14 balls to spare and clinched the first game by 9 wickets, thanks to the great batting performances by Smriti Mandhana and Shafali Verma.

Meanwhile, India’s skipper, Harmanpreet Kaur, opened up about the tactical skills and pragmatic approach they used to win the first T20I. The middle-order batter feels India women were perfect in all three departments; however, fielding was excellent, which helped them reduce to Aussies.

I just kept telling my bowlers to keep working hard and keep it tight: Harmanpreet Kaur

“We were up to the mark in all 3 departments. Fielding is something we are really working hard on. Today everyone is enjoying their fielding and really happy to see that. Credit goes to our fielding coach, he picked Jemi to slot at backward point and everyone knows their plan in the fielding and we got the results we wanted as well. I just kept telling my bowlers to keep working hard and keep it tight,” Harmanpreet Kaur said after the win,

“Credit to our head coach, we were about to pick a third spinner but in the last moment we decided to go with the extra seamer and we backed her (Titas Sadhu) and got the results as well. The way our bowling unit bowled today was superb, we would love to repeat this performance in the next game as well against Australia,” she added further.