Mumbai: Australian women completed a 3-0 clean sweep of their One-day International series against their Indian counterparts when they won the third and final match by five wickets on Friday. The Australian team won with 86 balls to spare at the Wankhede Stadium.
India had lost the first two games by 30 runs at Ahmedabad and a massive 221 runs here. Opting to bat, the Indian women mustered 175 for 9. Harmanpreet Kaur`s 63 off 74 balls and her partnership of 85 for the fourth wicket with captain Anjum Chopra (31 in 100 balls) resurrected the tottering home team innings and pulled it around from 30 for 3 to give it a modicum of respectability.
Harmanpreet struck 10 fours and a six before being dismissed by Indian-origin Aussie all rounder Lisa Sthalekar who finished with 1 for 32.
The other successful visiting team bowlers were Julie Hunter, Ellyse Perry, Jess Jonassen (all 2 wickets apiece) and Erin Osborne (1 wicket).
Australia started the run chase poorly to be 35 for 2 but eventually won the match with a degree of comfort by riding on opener Rachael Haynes 42 and Jess Cameron`s aggressive, unbeaten 90 off 87 balls with 4 sixes and 8 fours.
For the hosts, Shubhalaxmi Sharma bagged 2 wickets while Nooshin Al Khadeer and Ekta Bisht got one apiece.
The teams now move over to Vishakapatnam to engage in a best-of-five T20 series.
Scores: India 175 for 9 (Anjum Chopra 31, Harmanpreet Kaur 63, Reema Malhotra 22; Julie Hunter 2 for 28, Ellyse Perry 2 for 32, Jess Jonassen 2 for 14) lost to Australia 178 for 5 in 35.4 overs (Rachel Haynes 42, Jess Cameron 90 not out; Shubhalaxmi Sharma 2 for 41).
PTI
First Published: Friday, March 16, 2012, 20:49