By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
India beat Australia by five wickets to reach the finals of ICC Women’s World Cup 2025 final at DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai on Thursday.
Chasing a record 339 for victory, Jemimah Rodrigues brought up her maiden World Cup century off 115 balls and staged a stunning fightback alongside her captain Harmanpreet Kaur (89) as they posted 341-5 in 48.3 overs to end Australia’s World Cup winning streak.
Rodrigues was dropped twice throughout the chase but managed to keep her cool until the very end and when India needed two runs off 10 balls as her batting partner Amanjot Kaur (15no) drove Sophie Molineux (0-44) through the covers for a boundary to seal the win.
Earlier, Phoebe Litchfield (119 off 93 balls) became the youngest player to score a century at a World Cup as the 22-year-old helped the defending champions to 338 all out in 49.5 overs after electing to bat.
Ellyse Perry (77) and Ash Gardner (63) also made contributions, but India managed to fight back towards the end, taking three wickets in the final over thanks to Deepti Sharma (2-73).
India will now face South Africa, who beat England by 125 runs in the other semi-final, in the Women’s Cricket World Cup final in Navi Mumbai on Sunday.
Player of the match, India batter Jemimah Rodrigues: “This has been really hard but it is a dream and this has not sunk in yet.
“It was not to prove a point but just to win this for India. We have always lost in these situations and I wanted to be there until the end to take us through.
“Today was not about my 50 or my 100, it was about making India win. I did things at the right time and everything was just set up for this.
“I have cried almost every day in this World Cup with anxiety but God took everything for me.”
India captain Harmanpreet Kaur: “I’m very proud, I don’t have words to express myself. Feeling great, we’ve been working for so many years. It’s an amazing feeling.
“We’ve done this. We have this trust that every player can win any match, in any situation. We made some mistakes in this tournament, but we’ve learning from these mistakes. We kept telling ourselves to be there for the team.”
Australia captain Alyssa Healy: “Good contest in the end. We did that to ourselves a little bit. We did not finish off with the bat and we dropped catches in the field. We still hung in but we were outdone in the end.”