Indian cricket fans could celebrate on Sunday the 2nd of July 2017 when their women’s team won against a dispirited Pakistani in their ICC Women’s World Cup match at the County Ground in Derby. Electing to bat, the Indians had a disappointing batting display and could score only a paltry 169 for 9 in their quota of overs. But the bowlers brought India back into the game with a brilliant show and the pick of them was Ekta Bisht with a brilliant demonstration (5 for 18). Indian women bowled out Pakistan for just 74 in 38.1 overs and brought out an excellent victory for the team. Pakistan had the dubious record of getting bowled out for the lowest ever total in Women’s World Cup tournament when they were dismissed for 27 against Australia in 1997, but this time they managed to score 74.
Indians elected to bat first but never had a momentum in their innings losing Smriti Mandhana early for just 2. The skipper Mithali Raj (8) and vice-captain Harmanpreet Kaur (10) could not score much. Opener Poonam Raut (48) took her time to score her runs and consumed 72 balls and Deepti Sharma took 63 balls to score a sedate 28. Late in the innings, wicket keeper Sushma Verma scored 33 in 35 balls and brought the team close to 170 mark and the final six overs turned out to be productive for India which fetched them 41 runs. Pakistani left arm spinners Nashra Sandhu (4/26 in 10 overs) and Sadia Yousuf (2/30 in 10 overs) inflicted the maximum damage to the Indian innings. People expected a high-voltage encounter but were disappointed with the performance of the Pakistani team. Indian went into the match as clear favourites and proved that they are superior in all three departments of the game. In the earlier encounters with Pakistan at the World Cup, Indians had maintained a 2-0 advantage in head-to head records.
