ICC Women's World Cup 2022: Harmanpreet Kaur's Innings Against Australia A Warning Sign For Other Teams: Lisa Sthalekar

Harmanpreet Kaur’s valiant unbeaten 57 off 47 balls was not enough to see India beat Australia in a must-win clash at Eden Park in Auckland on Saturday, March 19. The Aussies beat India by 6 wickets to get to 10 points almost confirming their next round qualification. India, on the other hand, succumbed to their third loss of the ongoing World Cup campaign.

India came up with a better batting effort as they posted 277 with contributions from Harmanpreet Kaur and Mithali Raj. But Meg Lanning’s 97 coupled with Alyssa Healy’s 72 was enough to see the Aussies home. Former Australian cricketer Lisa Sthalekar was asked about Harmanpreet Kaur’s performance during a discussion with Star Sports. She said that the batter’s knock should send warning bells to other teams in the competition.

“India have kept with her throughout the last few years when probably she hasn’t delivered as many runs as should have and she seems to step it up come in World Cups. That half-century, she has been able to build that up, it is a real warning sign for other teams that she is starting to fire because we know how big she can go. So it was an excellent innings by Harmanpreet Kaur” said Sthalekar.

Harmanpreet Kaur Third In Highest Run-Getters List In This World Cup

Harmanpreet Kaur walked out to bat with India at 158/3 after Yastika Bhatia and Mithali Raj had strung together a 130-run partnership for the third wicket. A few lusty blows from herself and Pooja Vastrakar down the order took India to 277. Kaur has moved up to 256 runs from five matches so far in the tournament.

India are placed fourth on the points table after their defeat against Australia. They next play against Bangladesh (March 22) and South Africa (March 27) and both these games are must-win games if they are looking to make it to the semi-finals.