King and Mooney star as Australia escape catching nightmare
The visitors spilled five chances but still emerged from the opening T20I as comfortable winners
The visitors spilled five chances but still emerged from the opening T20I as comfortable winners
Scorer: K Vairavan | Commentator: Andrew McGlashan
Australia win by 43 runs and take a 1-0 lead in the series. In the end, a very comfortable margin for Australia but they were poor in the field - five clear chances put down. But Alana King made a superb return to the side with the ball and Beth Mooney's excellent innings had set up a good total on a pitch that wasn't easy for free-scoring. West Indies have much to ponder about their batting tactics and order. Worth noting that Sophie Molineux didn't bowl today. That's one to watch for the rest of the series as she returns from the back injury. Specialist captain today.
Beth Mooney is player of the match: "Was pretty tough early on, but if you stuck with it you got there in the end. To play T20s into the World Cup in foreign conditions, it's very important for us."
Hayley Matthews "Think we started really well with the ball, figured 160 would be a good score. As the innings went on it seemed like it slowed up a touch, then played a bit better after it got rolled. Come back strong, important to pick ourselves up, take the positives of how we bowled but last few matches have been disappointing with the bat."
Sophie Molineux "Nice to take home a win. They bowled really well, their seamers, and we were in a bit of a hole...that was one thing we spoke about, the partnerships. We've been training here and we've caught most, but we'll try to clean that up. Kingy was brilliant, had a new role in the powerplay."
That will wrap things up for today. We'll be back in a couple of days for the second match of this series. For now, from Gnasher and Alex, it's goodbye.
JKC Claxton c Gardner b Wareham 0 (1m 2b 0x4 0x6) SR: 0
SR Taylor c Voll b Wareham 28 (32m 25b 4x4 1x6) SR: 112
Wareham to close it out
The legspinner claimed three wickets in the first match against West Indies but may still be forced out of the XI at the World Cup
The visitors spilled five chances but still emerged from the opening T20I as comfortable winners
Caution will be taken with Australia's new captain ahead of the T20 World Cup later this year