In a finish for the ages, Sophie Ecclestone’s all-round heroics outshone Ellyse Perry’s brilliance as UP Warriorz pulled off a stellar victory in the first-ever Super Over of the Women’s Premier League at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru. With 29 needed off the last two overs, Ecclestone turned the game on its head, taking Ekta Bisht and Renuka Singh Thakur to the cleaners with four sixes and a boundary. Just as victory seemed within reach, she was ran out in a desperate dash to seal the win. But fate had one final twist—handed the ball in the Super Over, Ecclestone held her nerve and defended the target of eight runs, scripting an unforgettable triumph for the Warriorz.
With the pitch having a tinge of green and a few patchy areas, Deepti Sharma won the toss and decided to bowl first. Despite successfully defending their total in the last game at the same venue by playing to their strengths, she opted to chase—aligning with the prevailing trend in Bengaluru. That said, UPW’s middle order has had the lowest average in this WPL season. And that remained the case.
Despite Kiran Navgire’s feisty start to the chase, wickets continued to fall at regular intervals, leaving the lower middle order with the task of rescuing the match. UPW did keep the required run rate in check, however, the task seemed too steep to complete. A late charge by Ecclestone turned the tide for UPW, putting the match into the Super Over.
While Ellyse Perry’s fiery 90 off 56 in this game mirrored her 81 off 43 against Mumbai at the same venue last week, both knocks ultimately ended in losing causes. She took on UPW’s ace bowlers, Sophie Ecclestone and Deepti Sharma, to the cleaners. The latter, in particular, went for 16 runs in the 19th over.
Perry once again held RCB’s innings together, she surpassed her compatriot Meg Lanning as the leading run-scorer in WPL history. Perry has been in red-hot form this season, continuing her swashbuckling hitting against UPW, striking at a rate of 157 with three sixes and nine fours.
In the first innings, however, UPW followed a different strategy. Instead of looking to take wickets in the powerplay, they focused on limiting RCB’s scoring opportunities—cramping them for room, with pacers opting for short-pitched deliveries and spinners sticking to stump-to-stump lines.
In the first 10 overs, UPW used seven different bowlers as Sharma kept shuffling things to keep the batters guessing. Nevertheless, Ellyse Perry and Danielle Wyatt-Hodge stitched together a 94-run partnership, putting RCB in a strong position to post a competitive total.
Smriti Mandhana, on the other hand, continued to struggle against right-arm off-spin, losing her wicket early in the battle of captains—edging a fuller-length delivery from Deepti Sharma onto the stumps. Mandhana has now lost her wicket to Sharma four times in five T20s, while scoring just nine runs off her. Her overall average of 11.6 against off-spinners in the WPL remains below par, highlighting UPW’s clear intent to exploit her weakness.