After Oz debacle, India look to bounce back in series against WI

Her poor leadership under constant scanner, a beleaguered Indian captain Harmanpreet Kaur will need to quickly pick up pieces from the Australia series debacle as the hosts take on West Indies in the opening game of the three-match WT20I series starting here on Sunday.

Skipper Harmanpreet expects team to regain confidence

Skipper Harmanpreet Kaur backed the Indian women’s team to regain confidence in home conditions during the three-match T20I series against West Indies. “After the World Cup, we played against New Zealand and did really well in the home conditions. The Australia tour result was not something we were expecting but lot of learnings for us,” Harmanpreet said. “In India, we have played good cricket. Apart from the World Cup and the Australia tour, if I see this year, we played really good cricket, we won a lot of matches in home conditions. These things happen and as a team it’s very important for us to stay together and think about all the positives we have done in the past,” she said.

India have won each of their last eight T20Is against West Indies in the shortest format since November 2019.

But to maintain this dominating run, India will have to dig deep from rapidly depleting reservoirs of both resources and confidence to keep the ship afloat.

It has not been a smooth ride for the Indian skipper whose questionable selection calls during the Australia ODI series left everyone wondering as to how long the national selectors will persist with her despite Smriti Mandhana well and truly ready to take over the mantle.

This is India’s first T20 series after the inglorious T20 World Cup exit where the only consolation was a hard-earned win against Pakistan.

After that, India won an ODI series against New Zealand at home and were blanked by Australia during the subsequent 50-over series Down Under.

While Harmanpreet’s own batting form has been better than many, it is her unimaginative leadership that is causing a lot of problems as the team is still playing an archaic brand of cricket across both white ball formats.

The profligate Shafali Verma has been ignored by the selectors once again even though her chances of doing well in T20Is in Indian conditions is way better where she can employ her cross-batted game.

First-up, India will need a quick turnaround from their forgettable ODI tour of Australia which ended in a 0-3 rout with the visitors being thoroughly outplayed in all departments. Having lost the final ODI in Perth on Wednesday, Harmanpreet and her side will not have got enough time to rest and recover as they have made it to the DY Patil Stadium for the series opener.