Seamer Pooja Vastrakar and off-spinner Sneh Rana showed enough craft to exploit a pitch offering variable bounce to bundle out Australia for a modest 219 in their first innings on the opening day of their one-off Test in Mumbai on December 21.
In their first essay, India raced to 98/1 at stumps as openers Smriti Mandhana (43 not out) and Shafali Verma (40) added 90 runs at the Wankhede Stadium. But India’s march to ascendancy began through Vastrakar (4/53) who teamed up with Rana (3/56) and Deepti Sharma (2/45) to halt Aussies’ innings in 77.4 overs despite a fifty by Tahlia McGrath.
However, Australia made a poor start as they lost opener Phoebe Litchfield in the first over itself after a mix-up with her partner Beth Mooney. Four deliveries later, Vastrakar produced a peach of a delivery to remove Ellyse Perry (4) and reduced Australia to 7/2 inside the first two overs. Vastrakar beat the defence of star all-rounder Perry by getting the ball move and disturb the stumps. But McGrath (50) came out firing on all cylinders to put pressure back on India, making most of the errors in line and in the field. McGrath was hard on anything that had width, racing to her third fifty in five Tests with eight fours while also utilising two lifelines in the form of dropped catches when she was on 18 and 45.
Source: PTI