Credit: BCCI/X
In the highly anticipated ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup (CWC) 2025 clash between India and Australia, currently underway at the ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium in Visakhapatnam, Smriti Mandhana brought her best with the bat after struggling for a big score early in the tournament. The Indian vice-captain scored 80 off just 66 balls with nine fours and three sixes against a top class Australian bowling attack to put her team in a strong position.
After being put into bat first by Australian captain Alyssa Healy on a placid pitch, Indian openers Smriti Mandhana and Pratika Rawal shared a 155-run stand in 24.3 overs, the highest first wicket partnership against Australia in Women’s One Day Internationals (WODI). During her swashbuckling innings, Smriti Mandhana became the first batter to score 1,000 WODI runs in a calendar year apart from becoming the youngest and quickest to 5,000 runs in the format.
As of this writing, India have reached 287/4 in 42 overs with Jemimah Rodrigues (25* off 13) and Richa Ghosh (27* off 18) at the crease.
Below are some of the fan reactions to Smriti Mandhana’s yet another fifty in WODIs against Australia on X:
Below are the playing XIs of India and Australia for their ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup 2025:
India: Smriti Mandhana, Pratika Rawal, Harleen Deol, Harmanpreet Kaur (c), Jemimah Rodrigues, Deepti Sharma, Richa Ghosh (wk), Amanjot Kaur, Sneh Rana, Kranti Gaud, Shree Charani
Australia: Alyssa Healy (c & wk), Phoebe Litchfield, Ellyse Perry, Beth Mooney, Annabel Sutherland, Ashleigh Gardner, Tahila McGrath, Sophie Molineux, Kim Garth, Alana King, Megan Schutt
