SERIES REVIEW
Follow UsA couple of hours before the team was announced for the white-ball series against Sri Lanka, Mithali Raj rocked the cricketing fraternity by announcing her international retirement.
While Mithali Raj was a leader par excellence for over a decade, and her records have been phenomenal as the Women in Blue reached the World Cup finals twice in her tenure, she was most importantly the glue to the Indian batting unit.
In her two-decade career, Mithali scored over 10,000 international runs across formats and the Sri Lankan tour was the first time an Indian team would play an ODI series without her since 1999.
India have been a force to reckon in the shortest form of the game with their heroics in the 2020 T20 World Cup. However, when they landed on the Lankan shores for the white-ball series, focus was on finding Mithali's successor.
With Harmanpreet Kaur now taking over the reins in the fifty-over format as well, India entered a new era keeping an eye on the World Cup set to commence in less than three years. While three years time seems a lot, the women's team play only a handful of series every year and hence every game becomes important in their bid to finalise the combinations for the World Cup.
The Women in Blue handed Harleen Deol an opportunity in the middle order, and she showcased glimpses of her talent in the first game with a valuable contribution of 34 off 40 deliveries. However, with S Meghana and Jemimah Rodrigues waiting in the wings, the 24-year ought to make the most of the opportunities to cement her place in the XI.
The three matches showcased India's plan for the future as they opted to use Deol and Shafali Verma as the spin-bowling options, hinting that Poonam Yadav has fallen off the radar. After a week of riveting cricket, the visiting side started their ICC Women's Championship with a bang by recording a 3-0 clean sweep.
However, they would realise that their performance in the three outings was well below-par, and despite the series win, they would need to go back to the drawing board and iron out some significant chinks in their armour before they head to England for women's cricket debut in Commonwealth games later this month and white-ball series against England in September.
On the other hand, Sri Lanka has been riddled with inconsistencies, and lack of depth in the batting department led to their downfall in all the matches. The hosts overly dependent on their skipper Chamari Athapaththu, her early dismissal would often derail their batting plans.
With the two sides on the opposite ends of the spectrum as far form is concerned, here are the key talking points from the series.
India's middle-order muddle
Over the past few years, one of the areas of concern for the Women in Blue has been the lack of runs in the middle overs.
Barring the second game, where Smriti Mandhana and Shafali Verma an unbeaten 174-run opening stand, the batting order has crumbled on wickets conducive for spinners.
In the first outing, they crawled their way to 172 runs courtesy of a match-winning partnership of 38 runs by Deepti Sharma and Pooja Vastrakar for the seventh wicket to bail India out of middle-order jitters.
The third match was no different as India were 124/6 before Harmanpreet and Pooja Vastrakar yet again rescued the team with a 97-run partnership.
Vastrakar's batting has been making the noises for the right reasons, and the all-rounder has showcased her skills down the order in the league match against Pakistan earlier this year. However, India would hope for their front-line batters to shoulder the responsibility.
Nilakshi de Silva: The glue to Sri Lankan batting
While India have been plagued by lack of runs from their inexperienced batters, Sri Lankan batters have also struggled to find their mojo in the three games.
Despite the youngsters not being able to handle the Indian bowling unit, Sri Lanka relied on the experience of Nilaskhi de Silva to guide the team in the middle overs and get them to a decent totals everytime there was a collapse.
With scores of 43, 43 and 48 not out, de Silva was the most consistent performer for the home team in this series. Despite not having a half-century to her name in the three games, the right-hander was the vital cog in the batting unit.
Sri Lanka can build on her experience and identify the core players for the next World Cup, which will help them improve their record in the iconic event and also spring up some surprises against top-notch teams.
The emergence of Renuka Singh
With a lot being spoken about the batting of the two sides, time to switch our attention to the bowling units. While spinners did well on tracks that aided them, one player impressed with her immaculate line and length.
In the absence of Jhulan Goswami, Renuka Singh opened the bowling for India and was brilliant in the series with seven wickets in the three games and wreaked havoc early in the innings.
The 26-year-old graduated to the national team by consistently performing in the domestic circuit for Himachal Pradesh. She made optimum use of her opportunity to trouble batters with her ability to swing the new ball both ways.
India's next assignment in ODIs will be against England in their den, and Renuka will be more than handy on wickets that will aid swing and seam.
