Pictures BS News Agency.
Bibhash Lodh, BS News Agency: The match between India and Pakistan is a battle of added excitement and prestige. In one such match, Indian women cricketers boosted their confidence by defeating Pakistan women cricket team by 7 wickets in the Asia Cup match at the Dubai ground with one-sided dominance. The Indian women's team, led by Harmanpreet Kaur, had already reached the semi-finals. Chasing Pakistan's 56 runs on Saturday, India scored 56 runs for 3 wickets with 11.2 overs remaining. With this victory, the Indian women's team's success record against Pakistan in the Asia Cup stood at 7-1. While India topped Group A, the Pakistan women's team will have to defeat Hong Kong in the last match of the group to keep its hopes of reaching the semi-finals alive.
Winning the toss, the Pakistan women's team, batting, was at one point 27 for no wickets. But then the batting collapsed. Pakistan's innings ended at 55 runs in 18.1 overs for 10 wickets. This was the lowest score by the Pakistan women's team in T20 cricket so far. Except for the two Pakistani openers Muniba Ali (13) and Shawal Zulfiqar (14), none of them could reach double figures. Indian bowlers N Sricharani (3-7), Prema Rawat (3-9), Deepti Sharma (2-5) and Shafali Verma (1-10) destroyed Pakistan's innings.
The Indian women's team lost the wickets of Smriti Mandhana (9), Shafali Verma (12) and Pratik Rawal (4) to reach the required 56 runs in 8.4 overs. Harmanpreet Kaur remained unbeaten on 18 and Deepti Sharma remained unbeaten on 12 runs. Pakistan captain Fatima Sana took 3 wickets for 17 runs. However, Indian bowler Sricharani was the man of the match.
After the match, Indian women's cricket team captain Harmanpreet Kaur said, "The team has got a very important victory against Pakistan. I am happy with the way the team performed. Especially the bowlers have crushed the Pakistani batters by bowling according to the plan and taking advantage of the pitch. It is important to play well in the next two matches to become the champion. I am confident that it will be possible. I never thought that I would go this far as a captain. I will play 150 matches in T20 cricket as a captain. Everything has been possible for the rest of the team's cricketers." Sricharani, the man of the match, wants to show her consistency in the remaining two matches of the Asia Cup. Sricharani needs one more wicket to get 50 wickets in T20 cricket