The Australian skipper has executed brilliant consecutive hundreds to guide her team into the last four of the World Cup, motivating them to a commanding comprehensive trouncing over Bangladesh.
Healy remained not out on 113, coming just a few days after her equally brilliant 142-run knock that saw off the Indian team at the same Visakhapatnam stadium. This time, she combined in an unbroken double-century first-wicket stand with her opening partner (84 not out) to chase to their goal of 199 runs in just 24.5 deliveries.
“I thought I was a little bit poor behind the stumps, and probably a bit as captain as well tonight, but we’ll take the win and progress,” Healy remarked.
Interestingly, the supreme expertise of Thursday’s run-chase as the pair added 202 runs followed perhaps Australia’s poorest performance in the field under the captain's stewardship, with the captain criticizing herself in particular for spilling a couple of the half-dozen chances that were missed.
“I felt somewhat let down with my glovework, and I needed to compensate with the batting, and fortunately delivered,” she added.
From the time statistics was initially recorded on fielding metrics in the year 2013, the six dropped catches represented Australia’s poorest fielding display at a World Cup tournament.
“Perhaps it’s just that time of the competition – we’ve been here a little while, and it’s an issue we’ll analyze,” the captain commented.
It helped the opposition to eke out 9-198 after they had opted to bat first, their highest score in an One-Day International against the Aussies, with a key batter scoring the first fifty ever for the Asian side against the reigning champions.
But the spinner's spellbinding unbroken ten-over spell, in which she took two wickets for 18 runs with four maidens, was vital to making sure Australia’s chase wasn’t too challenging.
The Captain Pleased with Win that Seals Knockout Place
Healy was pleased to learn that the victory, which places her undefeated team at the top of the group table on nine points after four victories and a abandoned match, secures them a berth in the last-four. “That's fantastic,” she said.
The 35-year-old skipper raced to her century off just 73 deliveries, the quickest hundred of the tournament, and ended with 20 boundaries off the 77 balls she confronted as she accelerated from her partner later in the innings after they had gone practically boundary-for-boundary towards their fifties.
The Opener Shines with Maiden Tournament Half-Century
The young batter Litchfield struck 12 fours and one maximum, reaching to her maiden tournament half-century off 46 deliveries soon after Healy reached hers off 43. They went on to achieve the third-highest partnership by any Aussie pair at a World Cup event.
Earlier, during the sluggish fielding display, the captain spilled the simplest of chances off Darcie Brown and also was unable to hold on to a difficult skied one off Annabel Sutherland. Annoyingly, she also take a clean chance off the same bowler but didn’t have it reviewed when the official turned down their appeal.
The recalled Darcie Brown bowled the fastest deliveries at the tournament so far but was nonetheless the team's costliest bowling option, going for 0-52 off her nine overs.
Spin Attack Thrive as King Stars
Instead, the slow bowlers excelled, spearheaded by Alana King, whose spell could have been even more productive if Beth Mooney hadn’t dropped one in the slip cordon.
Fellow spinners Georgia Wareham (2-22 off seven overs) and Ash Gardner (two for 48 off nine) both contributed, while Sutherland consolidated her standing as the tournament’s leading wicket-taker with her two for 41, bringing her total to thirteen.
A batter's 44 runs and another's unbeaten 66 runs off 80 deliveries took Bangladesh to their record total against the Australians, but the total was rendered straightforward by a team who had successfully pursued 330 runs against the Indian side a few days earlier.
“It’s always nice when you’ve got the ‘Q’ beside your name in a World Cup,” remarked star performer Alana King. “No doubt it doesn’t stop here. We anticipate going back to Indore to face the English team and the Proteas.”
