Beth Mooney: Appreciating the impenetrable bedrock of Australian batting

Beth Mooney has been a cornerstone for the Australian batting order

On a good day for Australia, Beth Mooney can convert a balmy afternoon into a breezy evening with her polished batting. On a bad day for her Australia, which aren’t that many, Beth Mooney can play the rescuer to a sinking ship. 

She bats with the authority of a leader who conducts herself with elan. She lends a purpose to each stroke proving cricket is still very much an intelligent sport in an age of bombastic strokemaking. 

Beth Mooney proved that, rather beautifully, in the high octane finals of the 2020-bound Women’s T20 World Cup, where her stroke-filled 78 off just fifty four deliveries hammered India. 

The immediate result of her steeliness at the wicket was a 151-run stand with Alyssa Healy, which birthed the highest opening run partnership for Australia ever in any Women’s T20I game. 

Beth seems to have the Indian bowlers on speed-dial whenever she feels like scoring runs

Beth Mooney did that again in the finals of 2022’s biggest sporting extravaganza in the Women’s game yet, where in the finals of the ODI World Cup, her 61 further strengthened the Aussies after Healy waged an assault over England with a no-holds-barred 61. 

And recently, when Beth Mooney scored her 61 against India, a familiar opponent she’s traumatised in the past, she didn’t just top score for the Southern Stars; she held onto her own in a tournament of epic proportions. 

The Commonwealth Games (2022), with all due respect to the Women’s World Cup, attract a bigger audience. 

Though of all that said, the true regard for Beth Mooney, which is at an all-time high at present, stems from the fact that she delivers - as she has- nearly every time there’s a crunch situation or if not, then an all-or-nothing stage. 

Arguably speaking, what could be any better other than making runs in the much-anticipated finals of a Women’s World Cup or the elite stage of a CWG 2022 cricket final? 

What could, it must be asked, be any better than making a permanent spot for yourself in a team bellied by one big match winner too many? 

Beth Mooney's contributios to the Aussie side have been nothing short of noteworthy

Where a Megan Schutt picks early wickets with her darting off cutters, Ellyse Perry upsets the rhythm of opponents with both bat and ball, and where any among the troika of Healy, Lanning and Gardner can carve bowlers to the any limit. 

Beth Mooney has further sharpened the Australian invincibility with her watchfulness and workhorse-like focus. 

Too often world cricket’s attention spotlights big starry names take Lanning or Healy from her own Australia or Mandhana, Dottin and Kapp for instance. 

But Beth Mooney has, by virtue of faultless consistency, elicited attention to the often unsung athletes like herself. 

A team player that can habitually slay any opponent putting to good use her concentration powers and that refined technique, Beth Mooney’s cricket is about converting opportunities into end results  

All of that being said, Beth Mooney at 28 with 54 ODI’s and 70 T20I’s against her name is still work in progress. And that’s largely because she has in her to go better nearly every passing game, do more for Australia and add more to her redoubtable craft. 

Maybe a century or two in the sub continent or a couple against the mighty bowling line ups such as the Proteas women will further solidify her batting; one that blossoms with two centuries each in both white ball formats. 

But where she stands at present, never lost in the crowd and never wanting to fit into one, Beth Mooney occupies her own special place in world cricket and is likely going to blaze a trail for many to follow. 

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