Indian opener Smriti Mandhana, on Friday, notched up her first Test hundred. Playing Meg Lanning’s Australia in India’s first pink ball Test, the 25-year-old took 171 balls to reach the three-figure mark. In doing so, she became the first Indian woman to score a Test century on Australian soil. 

Mandhana was caught in in the 46th over off a no ball. Only six overs later, the opener sent Ellyse Perry’s short ball to the fence to get to her hundred. She now has the highest ever individual score by a visiting woman in Test matches played in Australia. 

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Smriti Mandhana was dismissed for 127 (216 balls). 

Former India opener Wasim Jaffer congratulated Mandhana, calling her the ‘Goddess of the offside’.

“The Goddess of the offside. Congratulations on your maiden test hundred @mandhana_smriti. First of many. Well played,” he tweeted. 

On Day 1, India finished on 132/1 in the one-off Day/Night Test against Australia.

Mandhana added 93 for the opening stand with Shafali Verma (31 off 64 balls), before second session’s play was washed out. Verma was dismissed by Sophie Molineux. 

After stumps on Day 1 Mandhana, who is the first Indian woman to score a century in a D/N Test (pink ball), said that she had familiarised herself with the pink ball by keeping one in her kit bag for the last three months, looking at it on and off while trying to understand it.

“We just had two sessions with pink ball. I was coming from the Hundred (in England) so I didn’t really get much time to play with pink ball, but during Hundred, I just ordered a pink kookaburra ball, just to keep it in my room because I knew that there is going to be a Test match, so that I can just look at the ball and understand.

“I have actually not batted, I batted for just two sessions but the pink ball was there in my kit bag for last two and half, three months. I don’t know why did I carry it, I thought I will have a session but I really didn’t get time to do that,” Mandhana said during a virtual press conference on Thursday.