Team India's hopes of reaching the semi-finals of the Women's T20 World Cup 2024 are almost over. Team India needed a win against defending champions Australia in their last do-or-die match of the league stage but fell short. In this match played in Sharjah, despite a fighting innings by captain Harmanpreet Kaur (54 not out), Team India lost by 9 runs.
This defeat almost ended the hopes of Team India. Now all the hopes of Team India rest on the neighboring country Pakistan, who have to face New Zealand in the last match. If Pakistan creates an upset here and defeats Pakistan, then Team India will reach the semi-finals.
A huge comeback from Australia
Team Australia entered the match without their star captain Alyssa Healy, which was good news for India, but after the playing XI, Team India lost their leg spinner Asha Shobhana to injury, which proved to be bad news. However, Radha Yadav who replaced Asha in the team did not disappoint with her fielding and bowling. She took a brilliant catch of opener Beth Mooney off Renuka Singh in the third over. Renuka also took another wicket on the second ball.
Phoebe Litchfield played a quick innings
Here India had a chance to build pressure but a 62-run partnership between Grace Harris and captain Tahlia McGrath saw Australia take the wickets of both of them but then veteran all-rounder Alice Perry became a disaster. And he increased the run rate and took the team past 130 runs. In the end, Annabelle Sutherland and Phoebe Lichfield played a short but brisk innings to guide the team to a strong score of 151 runs. Renuka Singh and Deepti Sharma took 2 wickets each for Team India.
The innings fizzled out early, even Harmanpreet couldn't save it.
For Team India, Shefali Verma hit some brilliant shots as soon as she came on, but mistimed a big shot in an attempt to pick up the pace and was dismissed in the fourth over. Smriti Mandhana's poor streak continued in this World Cup and she was once again dismissed cheaply.
Captain Kaur's bat fails to hit the boundary
Jemimah Rodrigues, who saved Team India in the last several matches, could not do anything special this time and thus India lost only 3 wickets for 47 runs in 7 overs. At such times, captain Harmanpreet and Deepti Sharma took over the responsibility of the innings. However, the partnership between the two was very slow, with captain Kaur's bat notably failing to hit boundaries. Deepti certainly hit some fours and took the team past 100 runs, but it was here that India suffered a double blow. Deepti got out first and then Richa Ghosh was run out in the 17th over.
Only 1 run came in this entire over and it cost India heavily. A quick partnership of 28 off 18 balls in the last over between captain Kaur and Pooja Vastrakar raised hopes of victory but Annabelle Sutherland sealed India's defeat with a total of 4 wickets, including 3 in the last over. Team India could score only 142 runs by losing 9 wickets.
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