Australia v India: All you need to know guide | cricket.com.au

by Admin
October 12, 2024

Match Facts

Who: Australia v India

When: Sunday October 13, 6pm local time (Coin toss at October 14 at 12.30am AEST, first ball at 1am AEST)

Where: Sharjah Cricket Stadium, United Arab Emirates

How to watch: Amazon Prime Video

Officials: Suzanne Redfern, Kim Cotton (standing umpires), Jacquline Williams (third), Nimali Perera (fourth)

Live scores: Australia v India match centre

World Cup standings

Australia remain the only unbeaten team in Group A, and can cement top spot with victory over India. However there does remain a mathematical chance they could drop to second spot, or even miss out on semi-finals all together with a very heavy defeat to India.

India meanwhile will be desperate to defeat Australia to give themselves the best possible chance at qualifying for semi-finals. If India win, they will then hope New Zealand either drop their final game to Pakistan, or not win by enough to pass India on net run rate. A loss to Australia leaves them relying on New Zealand to also lose, and NRR again is a consideration.

As a reminder, here are Australia’s Group A fixtures:

October 5: beat Sri Lanka by six wickets

October 8: beat New Zealand by 60 runs

October 11: beat Pakistan by nine wickets

October 13: v India, Sharjah Cricket Stadium, 1am Oct 14 AEDT

The squads

Australia: Alyssa Healy (c), Tahlia McGrath (vc), Darcie Brown, Ash Gardner, Kim Garth, Grace Harris, Alana King, Phoebe Litchfield, Sophie Molineux, Beth Mooney, Ellyse Perry, Megan Schutt, Annabel Sutherland, Tayla Vlaeminck, Georgia Wareham

Players used: 13

India: Harmanpreet Kaur (C), Smriti Mandhana (VC), Shafali Verma, Deepti Sharma, Jemimah Rodrigues, Richa Ghosh (wk), Yastika Bhatia (wk)*, Pooja Vastrakar, Arundhati Reddy, Renuka Singh Thakur, Dayalan Hemalatha, Asha Sobhana, Radha Yadav, Shreyanka Patil*, Sajana Sajeevan. Travelling Reserves: Uma Chetry (wk), Tanuja Kanwer, Saima Thakor.

Players used: 12

Possible starting XIs

Australia: Beth Mooney (wk), Grace Harris, Ellyse Perry, Phoebe Litchfield, Tahlia McGrath (c), Ashleigh Gardner, Georgia Wareham, Annabel Sutherland, Sophie Molineux, Megan Schutt, Darcie Brown

* If Alyssa Healy is unfit

Australia are yet to provide an update on captain Alyssa Healy or quick Tayla Vlaeminck after the pair were struck by injuries during the win over Pakistan. Healy suffered an “acute right foot injury” while batting and had to retire hurt, while Vlaeminck dislocated her right shoulder in a fielding accident. Given the nature of the injuries, it is very unlikely either would play on Sunday, and their further participation in the tournament is under a serious cloud.

Grace Harris would likely come into the XI to bolster the batting in place of Healy, while opener Beth Mooney would take the gloves, and vice-captain Tahlia McGrath would captain the side. Australia have a few options to replace Vlaeminck; if they wanted pace there is either Darcie Brown or Kim Garth, or they could look to the leg-spin of Alana King.

India: Smriti Mandhana, Shafali Verma, Harmanpreet Kaur (c), Jemimah Rodrigues, Richa Ghosh (wk), Deepti Sharma, Sajana Sajeevan, Arundhati Reddy, Shreyanka Patil, Asha Sobhana, Renuka Singh Thakur

India have had a couple of injury concerns across this tournament, with Harmanpreet Kaur forced to retire hurt during their win over Pakistan, while Pooja Vastrakar missed the matches against Pakistan and Sri Lanka due to an unspecified ‘niggle’. However Harmanpreet confirmed on Saturday both her and her key allrounder were fit for selection against Australia.

How to watch

The new era for watching World Cup cricket in Australia continues.

All 23 matches of the tournament will be shown live on Amazon’s Prime Video online subscription streaming service after the internet giant recently acquired the Aussie broadcast rights for all ICC events for the next four years. There is no free-to-air Australian broadcast of this World Cup as a result.

You can sign up to Prime Video by clicking here.

How to recap

If you can’t catch the match live, you can catch on demand highlights packages on Prime Video.

The rest of the information you need will be right here on cricket.com.au: scores, recaps, interviews and highlights will all review what took place and keep you informed on the key takeaways.

Local knowledge

This will be Australia’s third game for this tournament at Sharjah Cricket Stadium.

Eight matches have now been played at the ground this tournament, and outside of Australia’s 8-148 against New Zealand, it has remained a low-scoring venue, with England’s 3-125 from 19.2 overs chasing against South Africa the next highest total.

This will be India’s first ever T20I at the ground, however they trained in Sharjah twice this week.

Players to watch

If Alyssa Healy is ruled out of this match, Beth Mooney will take on the dual roles of keeping wicket and opening the batting. It’s the role she has always played in the Big Bash so it is not an unfamiliar one, but it will be demanding in the Sharjah heat.

Harmanpreet Kaur has hit half-centuries in each of her last three innings against Australia at global tournaments. That included two fifties at the 2022 Commonwealth Games, before she almost steered her team to victory in the 2023 T20 World Cup semi-finals in Cape Town. With her team’s fate on the line, she will want to go big again.

Recent form

Past 10 T20 matches, most recent first. W: win, L: loss, N: no result

Australia: WWWWWWWWWW

Australia started their World Cup with a six-wicket win over Sri Lanka, followed by a 60-run victory over New Zealand, both in Sharjah. It became three from three when they defeated Pakistan in Dubai, and while it came at a cost with the injuries to Healy and Vlaeminck, it nonetheless continued their 10-game winning streak that included clean sweeps in their past two bilateral T20I series against New Zealand and Bangladesh. Their last defeat in the format was a historic first loss to South Africa during their multi-format series in January.

India: WWLLWWWWWNR

India started the tournament with a heavy defeat at the hands of New Zealand, in their first T20I since losing to Sri Lanka in the final of the Asia Cup in July. They have since got their tournament back on track, easing to victory over Pakistan before thrashing Sri Lanka by 82 runs.

Last time they met

Australia last met India in a three-game T20I series in Mumbai in early 2023. There, Australia won a three-game T20I series 2-1, with India’s sole win for the series came in the opening match at DY Patil Stadium. In that opener, Australia were bowled out for 141 batting first, a target India chased in just 17.4 overs for the loss of one wicket.

Australia then hit back, restricting India to 8-130 in the second game and chasing it down with an over to spare. In the decider, the Aussies kept India to 6-147, before openers Alyssa Healy and Beth Mooney both hit fifties to seal a series win.

Head-to-head

Played: 34

Australia wins: 25

India wins: 8

No result: 1

Rapid stats

Australia have lost only two of their last 14 T20Is against India, one via a Super Over in late 2022, and a nine-wicket defeat in Mumbai earlier this year.

Australia have won four of their six T20 World Cup matches against India, including each of their last two.

Australia have won 19 of 21 of their last 21 T20 World Cup matches, including their last 14 in succession – the longest winning run of any team in the history of the tournament. However both of their defeats in that span have come against India, in 2018 and 2020.

India have recorded bowling economy rates of four against Sri Lanka, and 3.8 against Pakistan, during the Powerplay in their last two matches.

Smriti Mandhana has recorded five scores of 50-plus in T20Is in 2024.

Beth Mooney (2,956) is 44 runs away from becoming the third player to score 3,000 runs for Australia in women’s T20Is. If she achieves the milestone against India, she would be the fastest player to reach it in the history of the format, surpassing Stafanie Taylor (103 innings).

Harmanpreet Kaur (672) is 55 away from becoming the all-time leading run scorer for India in women’s T20 World Cup history. She has scored 50+ runs in each of her last three T20I tournament innings against Australia, twice in the 2022 Commonwealth Games and in the semi-finals of the 2023 T20 World Cup.

Where to next?

We wait. Both teams will need to wait for the final two group matches to be played before they find out their semi-final fates. New Zealand will play Pakistan on Monday, then England meet West Indies on Tuesday, and both will determine the final standings.

Due to the idiosyncrasies of the tournament playing conditions, if India qualify, they will play in the first semi-final in Dubai on Thursday, October 17 (1am Friday AEDT) regardless of whether they finish first or second in Group A.

That would mean Australia, if they also qualify, would play in the second semi-final in Sharjah on Friday, October 18 (1am Saturday AEDT).

But if India fail to qualify, it reverts back to the top-ranked team in Group A (likely Australia) meeting the second-ranked Group A qualifier in Dubai on Thursday, and the top-ranked team in Group B meeting the second-ranked team in Group A on Friday.