Phoebe Litchfield Stands Out With Dynamic Ton as Australia Maul India to Sweep Series 3-0

Revenge sure is a dish best served cold. And that is exactly what Australia achieved today as India crumbled to a humiliating defeat in the 3rd ODI of the three-match series, to help the Aussies notch up a dominant win by 190 runs and sweep the series 3-0.

It was never meant to be from the get-go for India, who lost the toss and were forced to bowl first. Australia unleashed nothing short of hell on India as the opening pair of Phoebe Litchfield and Alyssa Healy put up a blistering partnership of 189 runs to set their team up for success.

The 20-year-old Litchfield brought up her second ODI century as she registered 119 runs off 125 deliveries in a stellar innings that included 16 fours and a six.

The youngster was provided ample support at the other end by the experienced Alyssa Healy as the skipper added 82 runs off her willow in the mammoth effort. Healy’s innings included 4 fours and 3 sixers before she fell prey to Pooja Vastrakar.

India seemingly regained a bit of control as Shreyanka Patil helped scalp a couple more wickets in quick progression, but the middle-order then came into play to help Australia stabilise their innings yet again.

Ashleigh Gardner, Annabel Sutherland, and Alana Kings all chipped in with contributions of their own as the women in yellow put up a total of 338 runs to rewrite the record books and register their biggest-ever total against India.

With a pressing need to get going early, India’s Smriti Mandhana came out guns blazing to put quick runs on the board and take the fight to the Australian bowlers.

Unfortunately though, it was not meant to last as pacer Megan Schutt picked off at both Mandhana and her opening partner Yastika Bhatia to quickly put the pressure on India again.

Then came in leg-spinner Georgia Wareham, who piled on the misery and scalped the big wickets of skipper Harmanpreet Kaur and a seemingly-settled Richa Ghosh.

With all the odds stacked against her, younster Jemimah Rodrigues came out of the pavilion and instantly looked to go on the counter-attack, slashing away a handful of boundaries to keep India’s hopes alive.

But, her aggression got the best of her as Rodrigues slogged one towards the onside which found nothing else but Alana King’s palms as Jemimah fell down in despair.

Then came the last nail in the coffin for India’s hopes.

With India’s top order failing to produce any meaningful partnerships, the pressure was on the lower-order to bear the weight of the chase and produce a miracle.

But, at the end of the day, it was Litchfield who produced a moment of sheer magic, as she snatched Amanjot Kaur’s lofted drive out of thin air with one hand to help Alana King grab her first wicket of the match as India went down six wickets for a mere 102 runs.

The wickets then just kept falling with ease as Australia cleaned up the lower order in another 10 overs, bowling India out for a mere 148 runs to register a staggering win by 190 runs to end the series on the highest of notes.

With this series win, Australia register their 9th consecutive ODI series win over India, a sign of sheer dominance.

After the match, Australian skipper Alyssa Healy stated, “We’ll take this 3-0 win. Three T20s to go, we’ll see how we do in that. We want to continue to maintain our standards, we weren’t too thrilled with our fielding in the first game, but we came out with a point to prove after that”.

The three-match T20I series between India and Australia will begin on