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The first Twenty20 World Cup semi-final has been washed out without a ball being bowled, prompting 'beaten' England to call for a reserve day in future events.

Gutted England captain Heather Knight hopes a reserve day is introduced for future Twenty20 World Cup semi-finals, having watched India advance to the tournament decider without a ball being bowled at a sodden SCG.

Play was slated to start at 3pm AEDT in Sydney but the heavy covers remained in place at 4.08pm, when umpires gave up hope of staging an abridged contest.

The MCG final isn't until Sunday, but the International Cricket Council failed to schedule a reserve day in case of either semi being washed out.

England were eliminated from the event when Knight shook hands with India counterpart Harmanpreet Kaur, whose side topped Group A after winning all four of their pool games.

England ranked second in Group B and paid a massive price for their opening loss to South Africa.

Knight was reasonably diplomatic after the farcical finish, which she dubbed "sad for the tournament", but made it clear that no team should suffer the same fate at future World Cups.

"They're the rules that everyone signed up to. Obviously there has been this situation and the game tonight is potentially going to be rained off as well, so you'd hope now there is going to be a rule change," Knight told reporters.

"That moving forward, no other team will have to experience going out of a World Cup purely because of rain. Hopefully it changes. We're frustrated.

"The weather has cost us. It'll be nice not to have the jokes about English weather now ... that's one positive.

"It's gutting. You put in a lot of hard work ... we're just going to have to rue that first game and try to move on, but it's going to be a bitter pill to swallow."

Kaur suggested her team planned for the prospect of a semi-final abandonment from the outset, knowing their path to the final could be determined by whether they topped Group A.

"We knew from day one at the start of the tournament that we have to win all the games," Kaur said.

"It was very unfortunate that we didn't get a game today but these are the rules and we can't help it."

Mark Waugh tweeted it was absurd the ICC did not have "reserve days for finals in the biggest tournament of the year and possibly lifetime for many players".

Knight will attend Sunday's final as a fan and insisted her team's miserable exit should not take the shine off a tournament that has further progressed women's cricket.

"You see if the money is put into publicising it that people do want to come and watch," she said.