Cricketers face music after flop
AUSTRALIA coach Matthew Mott admits he and his side will face some tough questions after crashing out of the Women’s Cricket World Cup.
The defending champions lost by 36 runs to India at Derby following a batting onslaught from Sydney Thunder WBBL star Harmanpreet Kaur.
Kaur smashed 20 fours and seven sixes in her unbeaten 171 from just 115 deliveries as India chalked up an imposing 4- 281 in 42 overs after the match was shortened due to a three- hour rain delay.
In response, Meg Lanning’s side slumped to 245 all out after Alex Blackwell hit 90 from 56 balls in a last- wicket stand of 76 with Kristen Beams.
Aside from Blackwell, Elyse Villani ( 75) and Ellyse Perry ( 38), no other player scored more than 14, with Lanning falling for an eight- ball duck in a rare failure with the bat.
“Pat Howard, the boss, will certainly ask some questions so when we get home we’ll have to face the music I guess,” said Mott.
“We’ll go through what went right, what went wrong and there’ll be a lot of questions asked.
“We came here with the expectation to win. We had a team that could have won.
“Now’s not the time. We’ll let it digest. We’re hurting a fair bit at the moment but there’s certainly a lot of areas we can work on.”
Kaur’s innings mirrored that of Sri Lanka’s Chamari Atapattu, who scored 178 earlier in the tournament, with the Australian bowlers again having no answer to a player in imperious touch with the bat.
Lanning conceded she was at a loss as to how to stop Kaur.
“We just sort of gave her a little bit too much to work with and it was pretty hard ground to defend once she got going,” Lanning said.
“In hindsight maybe if you had someone different but our spinners have done a great job for us ... and it just didn’t really happen today.
“I had to turn to Elyse Villa- ni there for an over just to try something different and hope that it worked but it didn’t.”
Lanning and her players will return to an uncertain future with the squad officially unemployed and the MoU dispute between Cricket Australia and the Australian Cricketers’ Association no closer to a resolution. Several of the squad will remain in England to play in the domestic T20 competition but Lanning will return home for treatment on her damaged shoulder.