Women's World Cup: Indian bowlers choke Australia, reach final

Chasing the total of 282, Australia was under pressure right from the beginning as they lost three wickets early.

Ellyse Perry and Elyse Villani had a partnership of 105 runs in the middle but immediately after their dismissals, the whole batting order collapsed. While Perry scored 38 (56), Villani played an aggressive knock of 75 (58).

Later Alex Blackwell fought a lone battle with the tail. She played a sensational innings towards the end which made the women in blue nervous for some time. Blackwell scored 90 from just 58 balls.

Deepti Sharma had the best bowling figure with 3/59 in 7.1 overs. Jhulan Goswami, Shikha Pandey shared two wickets each.

Earlier, Harmanpreet Kaur went on to score a big hundred as India posted a total of 281/4 in 42 overs.

Kaur's unbeaten 171 runs innings from 115 balls anchored the innings of Indian team through out.

Winning the toss, India came out to bat and had a slow start along with the initial fall of wickets.

Both the openers, Smriti Mandhana and Punam Raut, were dismissed early but it was the partnership between skipper Mithali Raj and Harmanpreet Kaur instilled life into the Indian batting.

Though Raj got out at 36 (61), Kaur partnered Deepti Sharma and later Veda Krishnamurthy to guide the team to a big total.

All Australian bowlers went at high run rate. Ashleigh Gardner was economical comparatively with the bowling figure 1/43 in eight overs.

The match was reduced to 42 overs each side due to rain.

India will play the final against England on Sunday.

Image: Official Facebook page of ICC.