IND-W vs NZ-W: Harmanpreet Kaur & Co. face stern test in ODI series against T20 World Cup champion New Zealand

Harmanpreet Kaur’s women have a chance for immediate revenge. They take on New Zealand in the first of a three-match ODI series here on Thursday.

India’s captain Harmanpreet Kaur during a practice session. | Photo Credit: VIJAY SONEJI / THE HINDU

There was this tall, athletic woman from Auckland one came across on a chilly, windy afternoon at Wimbledon last week.

Maree, in London to visit her daughter, has played competitive cricket back home, and she was talking, with a tinge of disappointment, about New Zealand’s underachievement despite producing champion cricketers like Martin Crowe.

Maree must be a happy woman now – after that Super Sunday for New Zealand cricket.

At Bengaluru, the men won a Test match for the first time in India in 36 years. A few hours later, across the Arabian Sea at Dubai, the women won the T20 World Cup, for the first time ever.

If the Arabian nights provided memories for a life time for New Zealand’s female cricketers, they were a nightmare for their Indian counterparts. The Women in Blue failed to make the semifinals.

Their campaign had begun on the wrong foot, losing to New Zealand. It would prove costly in the end, as the Kiwis edged past India in the group and entered the last-four.

Harmanpreet Kaur’s women have a chance for immediate revenge. They take on New Zealand in the first of a three-match ODI series here on Thursday.

It is not just the score from the T20 World Cup that the Indian women have to settle; they had been thrashed 1-4 when the two sides met in an ODI series. That was in New Zealand in early 2022.

Amelia Kerr was the star of that big series win for the White Ferns. She had plundered 353 runs at an average of 117.66, with a hundred and three fifties.

And Kerr is still in a mood to hurt the Indians more. She was the player of the final and of the series at the T20 World Cup.

The 24-year-old leg-spinning all-rounder has also the Women’s Premier League (WPL) experience. As has captain Sophie Devine, whose explosive batting could worry any attack.

The Indian bowlers will also have to contend with Suzie Bates, New Zealand’s other hard-hitting veteran. The likes of Renuka Singh, Radha Yadav and Deepti Sharma have a task on their hands.

In skipper Harmanpreet, Smriti Mandhana, Shafali Verma and Jemimah Rodrigues, there is class in the Indian batting line-up, though Richa Ghosh will be missed. She is taking her school examinations.

Richa’s teammates face a sterner test.

THE TEAMS

INDIA WOMEN

Harmanpreet Kaur (c), Smriti Mandhana, Shafali Verma, D. Hemalatha, Deepti Sharma, Jemimah Rodrigues, Yastika Bhatia, Uma Chetry, Sayali Satgare, Arundhati Reddy, Renuka Singh, Tejal Hasabnis, Saima Thakor, Priya Mishra, Radha Yadav, Shreyanka Patil.

NEW ZEALAND WOMEN

Sophie Devine (c), Suzie Bates, Eden Carson, Lauren Down, Izzy Gaze, Maddy Green, Brooke Halliday, Polly Inglis, Fran Jonas, Jess Kerr, Amelia Kerr, Molly Penfold, Georgia Plimmer, Hannah Rowe, Lea Tahuhu.