England beat India by four runs in a close encounter in the ICC Women’s World Cup. At the post-match presentation, Indian captain Harmanpreet Kaur pointed out that Smriti Mandhana’s dismissal was the turning point of the match.
“I think Smriti’s wicket was the turning point for us, and I still feel we had enough batters,” she said. “I don’t know how things went the other way, but credit goes to England. They didn’t give up. They kept bowling well and continued taking wickets. It feels bad because you’ve put in so much hard work and kept ticking all the boxes until the end, but the last five or six overs didn’t go according to plan. That’s the worst part – it’s definitely a heartbreaking moment.”
When Smriti was dismissed after playing a fine knock of 88 runs, India needed 55 runs from 52 balls with six wickets in hand and looked favourites to win the game. However, England applied the pressure, as boundaries were hard to come by in the final five overs, during which India managed only 31 runs and lost two wickets.
Harmanpreet praised her bowlers for restricting England to under 300 but acknowledged that the final overs of India’s batting ultimately cost them the match.
“Our bowlers did a really good job, because when Nat and Heather were batting, they looked really strong. We thought that if we could restrict them to under 300, it would be a positive for us – the pitch and the ground are very fast, and we believed we could chase, which is why we chose to bowl first. We did a lot of things right. But again, the last five overs are something we, as a group, need to sit down and rethink,” she added.
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