Johannesburg: Vice-captain Smriti Mandhana and senior all-rounder Deepti Sharma would like to bring out their respective ‘A’ games with the Indian women’s team trying to pulls all its stops to get back to winning ways against South Africa in the third T20 International here on Wednesday.
The Proteas women lead the five-match series 2-0 and would like to complete the series win in the third match at the Bull Ring.
Mandhana, easily the team’s most impactful batter, scored 13 and 12 in the first two games in which India put up an underwhelming show with totals of 157 and 147, which the home team surpassed without breaking much sweat.
As far as Deepti is concerned, her form has been more worrisome. She was demoted to No. 9 in the first game, where she remained not out on 1 and was dismissed for the same score in the second game, where she was sent up the order at No. 6. In both games, she went wicketless.
The Indian batting is very much dependent on Mandhana’s free-flowing starts, and the stylish southpaw would like to make amends for the poor returns in the first two games. Indian skipper Harmanpreet Kaur and Jemimah Rodrigues did get some runs in the first match but came a cropper in the second outing.
With the T20 World Cup in England only a couple of months away, Harmanpreet and her team would like to get its mojo back and notch up a few victories, which is essential to boost the morale of the team.
What has hurt India more is the fact that there has been no power-hitting at the back-end of the innings leading to below par totals in both games.
“If you see both the games in 12 overs or so, we were at 100, and then after that we couldn’t finish the way we wanted them to but that always happens in cricket,” bowling coach Aavishkar Salvi said at the pre-match press conference.
On Deepti’s form, Salvi defended the veteran all-rounder, who was a star performer during India’s WODI World Cup triumph.
“One or two games or three games doesn’t justify the kind of talent she (Deepti) is, the kind of performances she has put in over the years. She is not at her best as of now, but she has gone back to the drawing board, discussing all her game plans and what she wants to use during the games.
“It’s only a matter of a few instances where probably she just strikes, and she comes back shining,” Salvi backed her with all intent.
For the Proteas, skipper Laura Wolvaardt has once again proved to be a thorn in the flesh for India with back-to-back half-centuries (51 and 54) and Sune Luus scoring a brisk 57 in the second game.
The Indian attack has also looked rudderless during Powerplays, and Salvi admitted that they are currently carrying out a trial and error as to which bowlers would work during the global event.
“We are actually giving opportunities to all the bowlers to operate into that segment so that we don’t rely only on a few bowlers coming into the main event (T20 World Cup).
“But obviously, yes, we would like to pick wickets, we would like to strike early, we would like to use the power play from the bowling point of view so that we create that impact initially into the game,” Salvi added.
Teams (from): India: Harmanpreet Kaur (captain), Smriti Mandhana, Shafali Verma, Jemimah Rodrigues, Bharti Fulmali, Anushka Sharma, Deepti Sharma, Arundhati Reddy, Shree Charani, Kashvee Gautam, Richa Ghosh, Uma Chetry, Renuka Singh Thakur, Kranti Gaud, Shreyanka Patil.
