New Chandigarh, Sep 17 (IANS) Vice-captain Smriti Mandhana registered the second-fastest century by an Indian batter in women’s ODIs when she reached the three-figure mark in 77 balls against Australia in the second match of the ongoing series at the Maharaja Yadavindra Singh International Cricket Stadium on Wednesday.

The left-handed opener brought up her 12th ODI hundred with a lofted six over mid-off against Tahlia McGrath and is now only behind her own record of the fastest century by an India women’s batter – coming in 70 balls against Ireland earlier this year in Rajkot.

Eventually, Smriti made 117 off 91 balls, hitting 14 fours and four sixes at a strike-rate of 128.57. Smriti is now level with England’s Tammy Beaumont on the all-time ODI hundreds list, with only New Zealand’s Suzie Bates (13) and former Australia captain Meg Lanning (15) ahead of her. She has also equalled with Suzie for the record for most centuries by an opener (12).

After India were sent in to bat first by Australia, the elegant Smriti was at her fluent and aggressive best from the word go and reached the three-figure mark in just her 106th innings as an opener since debuting in 2013.

A distinct feature of her knock was that she heavily scored in the leg-side as compared to her trademark way of accumulating runs in the off-side. Smriti’s ton is also the fastest century by a batter against Australia in women’s ODIs, with the previous best belonging to England skipper Nat Sciver-Brunt, who reached the landmark in 79 balls.

Her knock adds to a growing list of rapid centuries by Indian batters in recent years, including Harmanpreet Kaur’s 82-ball hundred against England coming earlier this year and Jemimah Rodrigues’ 89-ball ton against South Africa, which happened last year.

With Jemimah sidelined from the remainder of the series due to viral fever, the onus was on Smriti to anchor India’s batting effort and though she fell to Tahlia in the 33rd over, she has laid the platform for the hosts’ to at least post a total of around 300.

–IANS

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