Indian skipper Harmanpreet Kaur is not enthused with suggestions that seasoned campaigner Mithali Raj, who could not force the pace in the PowerPlay against Australia, should drop down the order against England in the T20 tri-series match on Sunday.
“When there a flop innings happens, talks like these (changing the batting order) happen. She has played good knocks for the team. We can’t hurry because of one match.
“Batting order and bowling line-ups will change as per the need of the team, because at the end of the day, we should think about the team. Our team meeting is yet to happen,” said Harmanpreet after the team’s training session on Saturday.
The home team, after a good start, clearly struggled against Australia, but Harmanpreet said people would have seen the improvement, especially in the fielding department.
Responding to Smriti’s observations that the team has not learnt from mistakes, Harmanpreet said: “If you compare our T20 performance against the previous ODIs against Australia, we have improved a lot.
“Still there are a lot of areas where we need to improve and we are working on that. This is a short format and the outcome of the match depends on the momentum, which England had against Australia.’’
Pointing out the rule which allows for only our fielders outside the restriction area in the non-PowerPlay overs, the Indian skipper said: “so even if we get 150, it is not easy for the bowlers.
“T20 is such a format that when the batters are in flow, they want to play the big shots. I think 180 would be a decent total on this wicket. But 180 can also be chased considering the batting line-up of three teams. As a bowling unit we are working on certain areas like slog overs and first six overs, which are important for us.”
India won the first T20 match against England at Derby in August 2006 and a second in Mumbai in March 2010.
After this win, India has lost seven in a row. The home team’s task is cut out on Sunday.
The teams (from):
India: Harmanpreet Kaur (Capt.), Smriti Mandhana, Mithali Raj, Veda Krishnamurthy, Jemimah Rodrigues, Anuja Patil, Deepti Sharma, Taniya Bhatia (wk), Poonam Yadav, Radha Yadav, Jhulan Goswami, Shikha Pandey, Pooja Vastrakar, Rumeli Dhar and Mona Meshram.
England: Heather Knight (Capt.) Tamsin Beaumont, Kate Cross, Alice Davidson-Richards, Sophie Ecclestone, Tash Farrant, Katie George, Jenny Gunn, Alex Hartley, Danielle Hazell, Amy Jones, Anya Shrubsole, Bryony Smith, Nat Sciver, Fran Wilson and Danni Wyatt.
