NEWS
Follow UsAustralia have had two contrasting powerplays in the opening two games of the 2024 Women’s T20 World Cup. While they started with circumspect outing against Sri Lanka on a slow Sharjah surface, they took a refreshingly aggressive strategy against New Zealand a few days later.
Beth Mooney, who is known as an ‘ICC specialist,’ has been integral to maintaining that consistency. The left-handed batter has only scored 17 runs in the powerplay but has been a rock after that, with 83 runs in the tournament, only behind Danni Wyatt-Hodge and Laura Wolvaardt.
Mooney, in the post-match press conference, insisted that Australia have thus far been ‘finding ways’ to make it work with the bat. Even if it means they have to dig deep to find ways to score with a long batting order.
“We knew throughout this tournament that we'd have to dig pretty deep with the bat and try to find a way to score runs. Sometimes, that's going to look pretty ugly, and sometimes, it's going to be okay, but I think if we just find a way to make it work, that will hold us in good stead, which is what we did tonight,” Mooney said.
While the first win against Sri Lanka was slightly nervy, their victory against the White Ferns was as clinical as it could get, with a 60-run win. But even then, Mooney insisted that they had missed quite a few runs after getting off to a flier on that surface.
“Yeah, it's not far off I think if we're being really critical, we probably missed out on a few with the bat towards the middle on the back end there with a few wickets in a row but certainly really pleasing the spot that we've got ourselves into in this tournament,” she said.
“You know, seeing the likes of Megan [Schutt] and Annabel [Sutherland] coming to the fore on wickets that are perhaps considered a bit more spin-friendly that those guys are having a huge impact, so yeah, really pleasing where we're at and certainly very happy with that result tonight,” she added.
After two games in Sharjah, Australia will face a fresh challenge when they travel to Dubai to take on Pakistan in a game that could potentially seal their way to the semi-final stage of the competition.
“I think there's going to be different challenges thrown at us throughout the tournament and we're just going to have to adjust where we can. We adjusted slightly tonight to these conditions and we're going to have to do that again at Dubai on Friday night when we play Pakistan,” Mooney said.
The Australian opener insisted that there’s nothing as ‘cracking the code’, and Australia would have to come again prepared for a fresh start against their Asian rivals on October 11.
“So, I don't know if there's such thing as cracking the code in cricket. It's always, there's always a tough game out there, especially in this format. So, we'll have another training session on Thursday night and come back together and have a look at Pakistan and go again on Friday.”
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