India finished their tour of England with a 13-run win at Chester-le-Street and a 2-1 one-day international series victory, although England came desperately close to pulling off what would have been a record run chase, falling just short of their 319-run target.
The hosts had been in trouble at eight for two, but Nat Sciver-Brunt and Emma Lamb overcame the faltering start to add 162 runs for the third wicket and give England hope.
Lamb was bowled by Shree Charani for 68 and Sciver-Brunt gloved the ball to a diving Richa Ghosh in the 35th over, two runs short of a century. Some nifty boundary-striking in the gaps from Sophia Dunkley, Charlie Dean and Alice Davidson-Richards kept them in touch. But with England needing 55 from the last five overs, Jemimah Rodrigues held on to two excellent catches at long-on and seamer Kranti Goud finished up with six for 52, as the hosts were ultimately unable to quite match the late-innings acceleration of their opponents.
With the World Cup now 10 weeks away, England will take renewed confidence from the efforts of a middle order which looks at last to have absorbed some of the coach Charlotte Edwards’s lessons about prioritising intelligent cricket above showboating.
On the other hand, England could have sent Harmanpreet Kaur packing for 22, had they referred a leg-before call in the 28th over to the third umpire. It was one of two non-referrals which would have seen an India batter dismissed – the other was against Harleen Deol – and exposed some uncertainty about England’s DRS chain-of-command. Traditionally, it is the captain who makes the final call, but both times here Sciver-Brunt appeared to rely purely on Amy Jones’s judgment.
Sciver-Brunt eventually held on to a diving catch at extra cover to dismiss Kaur, but with just eight balls left of the innings it was too late to atone. India’s captain, who had failed to score above 26 in six previous innings on this tour, specialises in scoring runs when her back is against the wall and on Tuesday – after finally winning a toss at the eighth time of asking – her seventh ODI hundred was the mainstay of India’s match-winning total of 318 for five.
Earlier, Smriti Mandhana and Pratika Rawal had put on a 64-run opening stand for India, but their scoring rate took a nosedive when Sophie Ecclestone was brought on in the 10th over and proceeded to send down a remarkable opening spell of 7-2-14-1, including a wicket maiden in which a frustrated Mandhana pulled straight to Dunkley at short midwicket.
Ecclestone conceded just 28 runs in her 10 overs – an incredible feat on a day in which Dean went for 69, Linsey Smith 74 and Lauren Bell 82 – but she was bowled out by the 34th over, leaving India to go big at the back end, hammering 120 from the final 10 overs.
In an interview broadcast by Sky before the match, Ecclestone revealed that she had actually come close to retiring earlier in the summer due to the ongoing fallout from the Women’s Ashes, during which she came under fire after refusing an interview with the BBC’s Alex Hartley.
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“During that West Indies series [in May] I wasn’t actually sure if I was going to come back and play cricket,” Ecclestone said, while struggling to hold back tears. “I cried to a few people, I cried to my dad. It was a tough time. I was so tired and so drained from the last few months.”
Speaking for the first time about the Hartley incident, she said that she felt it had been “blown out of proportion”; “I had to put myself first in that situation. Warm-ups in an Ashes game were more important for me [than doing an interview].”
Ecclestone added: “I feel like I’ve come out the other side now. I’m back playing cricket and I’ve got a smile on my face again.”
