Twice Ellyse Perry sprinted to her right, twice she had to throw herself full length to the ground, twice with her right hand she slapped the ball back into play before it hit the boundary cushions. The second occasion drew understandable gasps from the small but vocal group of spectators dotted around Newlands. Four runs saved in a match, Perry and the Australians won their T20 Women's World Cup semifinal against India by five runs, earning their place in Sunday's final at Newlands against South Africa. In the two primary metrics Perry’s contributions weren’t eye-catching. She scored two not out off two balls in the final over of Australia’s innings and she bowled a dreadful over in which she delivered a wide, a no ball and conceded two boundaries. Yet she still produced two of the defining moments of a stunning game. It represented what sets Australia apart. They have great players, Perry arguably one of the best to ever play the sport, but even on an afternoon when Australia made mistakes in the field and with the ball their resilience and championship mentality was too much for an Indian side who fought bravely despite several mistakes of their own. “Ellyse Perry was elite on the boundary,” said Ashleigh Gardner, named player of the match for her 2/37 with the ball and a quick-fire 31 off 18 with the bat. “I certainly think 'Pez' was probably the blueprint for our side going forward, certainly on the boundary. Ultimately that [moment] could have been something I guess was the difference between us and them. ” It’s not that Australia were mistake-free. Alyssa Healy dropped two catches. However on the ground they were peerless. “They always field well,” said the India captain Harmanpreet Kaur. “The Australian side are better than us in the field. ” India shook off their error-strewn performance, which included a plethora of mis-fields and two dropped catches, to put the defending champions under enormous pressure with a thunderous batting performance, in which they regularly struck boundaries. Kaur, who made 50, said she felt that as long as she was at the crease, India would win. “According to the momentum of the match and the way we were playing, we shouldn't have lost like this. From the Australian team's body language, it looked like they gave up the match,” the Indian captain said. Then she got out, in very unfortunate fashion with her bat getting stuck in the crease of the strip adjacent to the pitch being used, with Kaur 15cm short of the crease. She flung her bat away in frustration when TV replays confirmed her dismissal. “It was disappointing because the way I was batting, maybe that was the only way I could get out. The way I was meeting the ball . . . I know how to take this innings till the end. “The moment I got out, the momentum shifted to Australia, I personally felt it was a turning point,” she said. India is the only team to have beaten Australia in the last three T20 World Cups, doing so in the group stages each time. It’s a bloody hard thing to do, and that much harder in a knockout match as the Australians showed on Thursday. They have won five out of the seven T20 World Cup tournaments, and as Gardner explained it goes beyond just the hatred of losing. “I guess, as a team, we always say that we want to keep evolving. Ultimately if we're evolving as athletes and as individuals, we are going to get better. “As a side, we always celebrate each other's success. And that's one thing we've done so well over the past few years, is we've got better as individuals, which ultimately then has an effect as a team. “It's pleasing to see people work extremely hard at their game, whether it's on or off the field. ” Perry, a serial winner with the Australians, one of the most celebrated cricketers of all time and someone who's made millions from the sport, exemplified that evolution with her two brilliant moments in the field. Support independent journalism by subscribing to the Sunday Times. Just R20 for the first month. .