Australia Women were crowned the T20 World Champions for the fifth time as they thumped India by 85 runs in the final at the iconic MCG. It was a lopsided affair as the Harmanpreet Kaur-led side was never in the game. Rather Australia were so dominant in all the departments of the game that they never allowed India to even win a particular phase of the game.

With the victory, Australia also bagged whopping prize money of $1 million (Rs 7.40 crores) which is five times more than what they won after winning the 2018 edition of the tournament. The ICC, in a meeting in October last year, decided to increase the overall prize money by 320 percent which meant that all the participating teams earned more which is great in terms of growth for Women’s cricket.

India won exactly half of Australia’s prize money

India Women, who ended up as the runners up for the second time in three ICC events, have won $500,000 (3.70 crores) after losing the final to Australia. The amount is certainly significant and the efforts made by the ICC should be praised as this was the first time that a Women’s global event was held standalone.

However, as far as the final is concerned, it was a one-sided game with Australia dominating the proceedings completely. After winning the toss, their opening duo Alyssa Healy and Beth Mooney stunned India with their assault. It was the former who led the charge from the word go and didn’t let the opposition settle in the crucial game.

Healy’s 39-ball 75 set the tone for Australia and Mooney just took over after her partner got out to score an unbeaten 78. Her knock steered Australia to a mammoth total of 184 runs for the loss of four wickets after 20 overs. India banked on Shafali Verma at the start to chase down the total. But the 16-year-old endured her bad day with the bat and got out in the very first over.

Smriti Mandhana and Harmanpreet Kaur never fired in the tournament before and they didn’t in the final too. Within the powerplay overs, the hopes for India were vanished as they were reduced to 30/4 with all their big guns back in the hut. Eventually, they were bundled out for just 99 in the final over of the innings to squander a great opportunity to make history.