Everyone has a bad day. Unfortunately for Melbourne Stars, the bad day happened during the final of the tournament. Everything went the other way for the Stars who were too good in the tournament right from the beginning, even ended the league stage at number one position. Sadly for them, everything began with the toss.
Lanning surprisingly opted to bat and immediately, Thunder were too good for them. Right from ball 1, they had the upper hand with Ismail, Johnson giving the team initial breakthrough and Darlington, Bates, Knight capitalized on the same.
Ismail and Johnson picked up two wickets each while others had one. Despite five drop catches, Thunder were managed to reduce the Stars to 86. Brunt top-scored with 22* for the team.
In return, Beaumont and Trenaman began their fireworks right from ball one and had 24 runs partnership before Beaumont got out to Brunt. While Knight witnessed Trenaman play a few shots, she took the charge when the former got out. Knight was then joined by Haynes when the team was needing only 30-odd runs. Probably, two of the coolest heads in the cricket then took the team home with ease. Knight came down the track smashed a six to finish the match and the tournament.
I don’t know women’s game can continue to be as inactive as it has been: Ian Bishop