X-factor Alan King shines for Australia as reigning champs clinch top spot at World Cup

By Sportsbeat

Alana King was hailed as Australia’s X-factor after a record-breaking spell wrapped up top spot at the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup 2025 for the defending champions.

The leg-spinner took figures of seven for 18, the best in the history of the tournament as Australia beat South Africa by seven wickets in Indore.

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That result clinches top spot in the group stage for the Australians, who will now face India in the second semi-final in Navi Mumbai.

And Tahlia McGrath, taking on the captaincy in the absence of Alyssa Healy, was fulsome in her praise of King.

She said: “That was good fun. How good was (Alana King)?! That was pretty awesome.

“Get the ball in her hands, something was going to happen. It felt like every ball was going to be a wicket. I’m super happy for her. She broke a lot of records, and it was a really special performance.

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“She is a bit of an X-Factor at this World Cup.”

The game had been in the balance when King was handed the ball, but from 43 for two, South Africa slumped to 97 all out as they could not handle her.

The first four of her wickets came before they had even taken a run off her bowling.

King said: “I expected it to slide on a little bit with a bit of the drizzle. I was just happy to extract as much as I can out of the wicket.

“As a bowler, you always love wickets. I can play a different role. If that is holding down one end, and then the other bowlers coming on to take wickets.

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“I was trying to give it a rip every ball. Some are going to hit the leather and slide on, some will hit the stitching and seam, they might spin.

“As long as they are coming out of my hand (well), that is only thing I can control. I’m not going to reinvent the wheel, just keep on doing (what I am doing) and take it from there.”

Needing just 98 to win, Australia lost a couple of early wickets, but a 76-run stand between Beth Mooney (42) and Georgia Voll (37 not out) helped them to a comfortable victory.

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The reigning champions are yet to drop a game in this tournament, winning every one bar a washout against Sri Lanka.

But McGrath knows that they will have to maintain that level against hosts India.

She added: “We have played a lot at that ground and against India. It’s a knockout game, you have to be on. Qualifying, job one done, now to job two – the knockouts.”

South Africa will look to bounce back from their second defeat of the tournament when they take on England in the first semi-final in Guwahati.

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The Proteas have faced England in each of the last two ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup semi-finals, losing on each occasion, while they also fell to a heavy defeat to the English in their opening game of the tournament.

Skipper Laura Wolvaardt is hopeful that this result will be the wake-up call the team needs ahead of the knockouts.

She said: “It’s not the way we would have wanted to end the group stage. We did not have runs. We’ve done a lot of good in the tournament, we will focus on that going into the semis.

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“That game (against England), we wanted to put it behind us as quickly as possible, we’re trying to learn as much as possible.

“Maybe it’s good for us to wake up a little bit. We’re used to a semi-final against them in 50-over World Cups, hopefully we can come out on top this time.”

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