Villani hoping to cement opening spot

Australia opener Elyse Villani hopes career-best performances in back-to-back matches against Sri Lanka will help cement a spot at the top of the order for the reigning world champions.

Villani finished unbeaten on 48 when the Commonwealth Bank Southern Stars secured an emphatic nine-wicket win with 195 balls to spare in the third one-day international at R. Premadasa Stadium in Colombo yesterday.

It was the right-hander’s highest score for Australia in the 50-over format, surpassing the 45 she scored in Dambulla on Tuesday.

Villani was left out of the ODI side that took on India and New Zealand last summer, but has shown what she is capable of following the first-ball duck in the series opener on the island nation.

“I think I’m on the right track,” Villani told cricket.com.au after the early finish.

“I’m always wanting to get better and make big runs at the top of the order. That’s the job of an opener.

“Hopefully I can continue heading on the right track as well.”

The Southern Stars were largely untroubled in the run chase, a vast improvement from the first ODI when they lost six wickets in pursuit of the meagre 77-run target.

Villani and fellow opener Nicole Bolton (35) made a watchful start to the chase, but pounced on anything loose to ensure the result remained inevitable.

“Bolts and I wanted to make amends for the first game where we were six down chasing a low total and we really wanted to get it none down,” Villani said.

“We almost got there, but it took a pretty good ball to get Bolts out.

“It was difficult to score out there when the spinners were bowling pretty straight.

 “We want to assert ourselves at the top of the order and hold the team in good stead when we’re batting.”

Villani was denied her maiden ODI half century when a sweetly-timed drive from captain Meg Lanning – and a horror misfield at mid-on – resulted in a boundary to finish the match.

“What can I say, she’s known for hitting fours so I wasn’t too surprised,” Villani said with a laugh.

“It’s just the way that it goes, but I was happy to be not out at the end and for us to chase the total one down.”

As Australia look to ramp up their preparations for next year’s World Cup in England starting in June, Villani will look to prove herself once again in tomorrow’s fourth and final ODI before returning home for a bumper summer of domestic and international cricket.

Having never been beaten by Sri Lanka in seven matches across the limited-overs formats, Villani insists the tourists are staying ruthless as they seek a clean sweep against the struggling hosts.

“We want to dominate,” Villani said. “We want to dominate every team that we play.

“We’re not taking them lightly as you can see.

“They can play some pretty good cricket at times, so we’re just hoping that as soon as that happens we can swing the momentum our way and keep playing the brand of cricket we’re playing at the moment.”

Fixtures

Fourth ODI*: R. Premadasa Stadium, 25 September at 2:20pm AEST

T20: SSC Ground, 27 September at 6:30pm AEST

*ICC Championship matches

You can follow regular updates from Australia's tour match, four ODIs and T20 in Sri Lanka at @SouthernStars on Twitter.