The Women’s Asia Cup T20 2024 is being held in Sri Lanka. The tournament started on 19 July, 2024 and will go on until July 28. The T20 Series started with a match between Nepal Women and UAE Women. India Women and Nepal Women came together in an epic clash for match 10 of Group A. On winning the match, Indian captain Smriti Mandhana admires team Nepal-W after defeating them.
The match was held at the Rangiri Dambulla International Stadium, Dambulla. India Women won the toss and opted to bat first. The power hitting team India scored an impressive 178/3 in 20 overs. On the other hand, team Nepal was restricted to a mere 96/9 runs.
“They (Nepal) always had a smile on their face” Smriti Mandhana Says
Team India’s captain Smriti Mandhana is ever the epitome of grace. Moreover, the much loved batter has shown time and again her importance in the team. As India scored so many runs losing only 3 wickets, Smriti did not get to bat today.
However, Smriti admitted how she was glad that the others were getting a chance to show off their skills. Smriti addressed the audience in the post match ceremony. The winning captain expressed her emotions on the win. Additionally she also praised the Nepal women for smiling throughout the match.
“As an opener you don’t get a lot of games where you don’t bat. Much needed game time for all the other batters. The middle order hasn’t batted in the previous games. The conditions were different and it is always good to have game time under your belt.” Smriti said.
“The middle order didn’t get time in the South Africa series as well, so good they could spend some time in the middle.The preparations started post WPL, there are a lot of fine tuning to be done and we have to keep improving, cannot go into a World Cup under prepared.” She added.
“They (Nepal) always had a smile on their face, sometimes with the amount of cricket we play we forget to enjoy the game. They played some good cricket and hopefully they keep improving and we get to play them often. You don’t take any team (semifinal opponents) lightly. We have two days to rest and practice before we go out and apply ourselves”. Smriti said, speaking highly of their opponents.
Here are the playing XIs of both the teams
As India and Nepal Women came together in what looked like a good natured match, here are the players for both the teams.
Nepal Women (Playing XI): Samjhana Khadka, Sita Rana Magar, Kabita Kunwar, Indu Barma(c), Dolly Bhatta, Rubina Chhetry, Puja Mahato, Kabita Joshi, Kajal Shrestha(w), Sabnam Rai, Bindu Rawal
India Women (Playing XI): Shafali Verma, Smriti Mandhana(c), Dayalan Hemalatha, Jemimah Rodrigues, Richa Ghosh(w), Deepti Sharma, S Sajana, Radha Yadav, Tanuja Kanwar, Renuka Thakur Singh, Arundhati Reddy
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