“We’re pretty dialed in, there’s not a lot of gags.”
Ellyse Perry and Ashley Gardner led Australia to a record T20 World Cup victory at Lord’s, knocking India out of the tournament with a convincing six-wicket win.
With India needing to beat Australia to reach the semi-finals, Harmanpreet Kaur’s 27-ball 56 took her side to 4-170, leaving their opponents with the toughest chase in the history of the tournament.
Australia had a difficult start at 3-85 after 9.1 overs, but Perry (56 off 38) and Gardner (53 not out from 29) came together for a 100-run fourth-wicket stand and took Australia home with six balls to spare, defeating their fierce rivals in the process.
Australia had little material risk associated with the result having already secured top spot in the group and a semi-final against the West Indies, but the chance to eliminate India, who ended their own ODI World Cup hopes last October, was a mouth-watering prospect.
Joining the Australians in every ball were South Africa, who had a nervy win over Bangladesh earlier in the day but were looking to defeat India to secure their berth in the semi-finals.
Australia will now face the Windies at the Oval in the first semi-final on Tuesday (11.30pm AEST), with hosts England and South Africa at the same venue on Thursday (3.30am Friday AEST).
It also means that India, the reigning ODI world champions, missed out on the knockout version of the T20 for the second straight tournament and are also out of the tournament at the start of 2024.
Renuka Thakur gave India a perfect start with the ball when she caught Georgia Fall (4lb) early in Australia’s chase.
Phoebe Litchfield, back in the side after an injury at four, and Beth Mooney took Australia to 1-49 at the end of the powerplay – their equal-lowest total of the tournament.
With pressure mounting from the Indian attack, Lichfield (24 off 25) opted for long-on and Mooney (22 off 20) bowled the ball off spin off Deepti Sharma, leaving the Australians at 3-85 still needing 103 runs from 65 balls.
Perry, fresh from scoring her first T20 World Cup fifty in the previous game, was joined by Gardner as their required score rose to 10.75 at the end of the 12th over.
Gardner then flipped the switch, hitting a four followed by a six from Radha Yadav in the 13th over for 17 runs.
After that the floodgates opened with 81 runs ending the score at 13-18.
The Australian pair chased the tournament’s leading wicket-taker Shri Charani – taking her out for 16 in the 15th over – and when Harmanpreet turned Thakur quickly to bowl the 17th over, another 17 runs occurred and Perry reached her second consecutive half-century off 33 balls.
As their tournament slipped away and the pressure mounted, errors began to creep into India’s game.
Kranthi Gowda’s arms made a four-ball error while Thakur’s wider shot found the outside of the field, gifting Perry a free kick.
By the end of the 17th over, the required speed was under control of the ball.
Gardner’s second fifty of the tournament came from 28 balls in the 18th over, and although Perry was dismissed with three of the nine balls required, Georgia Wareham sealed the win with a powerful drive straight down the ground.
Earlier, a late burst led by Harmanpreet, a tactical retirement and wayward fielding from Australia, who were under intense fielding pressure for the first time in the tournament, saw India score 36 runs from the last two overs of their innings to reach 4-170.
Up to this point, Australia had managed to contain India’s powerful batting line-up without making any major incursions as just two wickets fell in the first 19 overs, with one of them coming due to a major mix-up between Smriti Mandhana and Jemima Rogrigues.
Harmanpreet decided to give Australia a target after winning the toss and Mandhana got through the powerplay safely alongside Shafali Verma without breaking the shackles, reaching 0-43 at the end of the first six.
Skipper Sophie Molino waited until the 10th over to go into attack and had immediate success, bowling Verma for 26 balls of 34 to complete the opening partnership on 66.
The in-form Mandhana looked set to play a big role again against Australia, but an unfortunate mix-up with Rodrigues in the 12th over, when the latter was caught looking at the ball and Mandhana advanced too far down the field to retreat in time, saw the Indian vice-captain bowled out for 38 off 37.
Rodriguez was joined by her captain in the 64-run match and neither was able to completely break the shackles as they saw India at 2-134 after 18 overs, with Australia estimating their chances of retaining India at around 150 in total.
Rodriguez was then dropped twice in two innings – including a roped six off Wareham – while Annabelle Sutherland made 13 from the penultimate over.
The silver lining in Australia’s failure to break the Harmanpreet-Rodriguez partnership was that it left India’s biggest hitter Richa Ghosh on the bench deep in the innings.
India clearly shared this sentiment and Rodriguez was removed at the end of the 19th over to allow Ghosh to take center stage.
However, the move didn’t pay off as Ghosh hit a single off the first ball of Molino’s final over to escape the strike and it was Harmanpreet who gave India the boost they needed by hitting three sixes in a row, the third of which fell over the rope by Lichfield.
Her fifty came off just 25 balls but she missed out later after taking a catch straight to Perry at mid-on and Deepti Sharma smashed the only delivery she faced for four – thanks to another mis-pitch – to take the Indian total to 170.
‘No favourites’ in semi-finals, says Perry
ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2026
Team Australia: Sophie Molino (c), Ashley Gardner (VC), Talia McGrath (VC), Nicola Carey, Kim Garth, Lucy Hamilton, Grace Harris, Alana King, Phoebe Litchfield, Beth Mooney, Ellyse Perry, Megan Shutt, Annabelle Sutherland, Georgia Wall, Georgia Wareham. Travel reserve: Talia Wilson
Australia Group 1 matches
June 13: beat South Africa by 65 points
June 17: beat Bangladesh by nine wickets
June 20: beat the Netherlands by 98 points
June 24: beat Pakistan by 113 runs
June 28: beat India by six wickets
Semi-final 1: Australia v West Indies, The Oval, London, 30 June, 23:30 AEST
Semi-final 2: England v South Africa, The Oval, London, 2 July (3:30am 3 July AEDT)
Final: Lord’s, London, 5 July (00:30 6 July AEDT)
Click here to view the full tournament schedule
All matches will be streamed on Amazon. Prime Video