Alyssa Healy confesses she’s ‘still haunted’ by India defeat, skipped Women's World Cup final

Australia captain Alyssa Healy (AFP Photo)

Australia captain Alyssa Healy acknowledged that the devastating semi-final loss to India in Navi Mumbai still bothers her, adding it "will hurt for a little while". India defeated South Africa in the final to win the ICC Women's World Cup, which was after pulling off the greatest run chase (339) in World Cup knockout history, both men's and women's, against Australia in the semifinals.

Speaking with former wicketkeeper-batter Brad Haddin on the Willow Talk Cricket podcast, Healy discussed what went wrong for her team and how the defeat has persisted despite Australia's otherwise impressive performance at the tournament.

“Look, I’ve been better. I won’t lie to you. But at the same time, it is what it is. End of the day that, after seven weeks of a big long tour, we played some really really incredible cricket but didn’t quite get over a certain Indian hurdle, I suppose you’d say,” Healy said. “So, disappointing in that regard, but I’m looking forward to seeing what this team can do over this next cycle because it’s really exciting.”

“(We are) playing some amazing cricket and teams are having to keep up to knock us off, which I think is really cool. Obviously, I haven’t watched the final, but India got themselves over the line, which is really cool, and it’s great for the global game. So, from that perspective, it was an amazing experience, but obviously sitting here a little bit disappointed, and it’ll haunt me for a little while that one, but that’s ok.”

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Powered by Phoebe Litchfield’s maiden World Cup century, Australia piled a strong 338 in the semi-final, though Healy believed they fell short of the total they were capable of.

“Actually thought it was under-par,” she conceded. “I thought Ash Gardner played an unbelievable knock to sort of get us back up to that total, but I actually think we left a few out there towards the end. I think at one point we would have taken 330. We lost a few wickets towards the back end, but then, probably, the way that we’d set up the game, I think when Pez and Phoebe were in there looking really good with their partnership, we were looking at 350 plus. If we could have pushed up over 350, ultimately it might have made a difference in the end.”

Healy noted that the standard of cricket her team played throughout the tournament made the loss more painful. “That’s probably why it – I know we’ll probably get to it later and you’ll probably make me cry at some point – but that’s probably what makes it hurt more is that we’re playing so well. Everyone was contributing. Everyone was playing out of their skin which I thought was unbelievable and we had sort of half an off night and get done in a knockout game. One to reflect on, yeah, the team’s flying at the moment which is pretty cool but sad we don’t have a trophy to show for it,” she said.

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Healy also talked about the circumstances surrounding India's record chase, including how the red soil at DY Patil Stadium performed differently under lights. “The red soil at DY Patil there, it generally doesn’t let the dew affect it as much. I think the wicket definitely started a little slower than what we’d been used to. Played on black soil basically the whole World Cup leading into that fixture and the red soil probably was a little bit slower off the surface early on than what we had been used to. It definitely looked like under lights towards the back end, you know, it was sliding on nicely,” Healy explained.

“I think we probably didn’t help ourselves in that regard as well. We probably weren’t quick enough to adapt to bowling a change of pace. It did rain a little bit. Probably made it slide on a little bit more as well, but we just sort of missed a little bit with the ball at the back end and but like I said, we created opportunities throughout our fielding innings to defend that total and get key wickets along the way, but we just weren’t able to capitalise on that. and that’s what you’ve got to do in knockout fixtures in World Cups and that’s traditionally what Australia have done really well in the past. So, yeah, a little bit disappointing in that regard,” she said.

Healy and Tahlia McGrath both failed to cling onto opportunities that may have changed the course of the game, while Jemimah Rodrigues' drops on each side of her century were two pivotal moments in the Indian innings. India arrived home with more than an over to spare, and Jemimah was undefeated on 127.

Healy also vividly remembered her own dismissal earlier in the day, particularly the pandemonium brought on by lighting problems and rain delays. “You know when you get a bad feeling? I was actually thinking to myself, I think I should just wait a little bit longer because we’re going to go off. I think I should just wait. But I’d already waited because we had a three-minute wait and the lights were meant to go on in the break. And then I said to the umpire, are they going to come on mid ball? Like, should we wait for them to come on? And she’s like, they’ve told us at the end of the over. So, as I was set up, ready to go and the bowler was about to run in, the lights went on. Well, one of the lights went on. So, then we had to wait for all of the lights to flick on,” Healy said.

“At the other end, people were walking in front of the sightscreen. There was just a lot of chaos around, which is sometimes what happens over in India. There are just people everywhere doing different jobs around the ground, and it was really frustrating. If I’d have waited a minute longer, we would have been off the field and then we come back on and have another crack at it.”