One, two, three, four, five, six and seven. No, we aren’t in the business of counting numbers. In a nutshell, that is just the number of catches dropped by Pakistan in their all-important Women’s T20 World Cup game versus New Zealand, played at the Dubai International Stadium. On expected lines, those fluffed chances proved to be costly as New Zealand usurped Pakistan by 54 runs and qualified for the semi-finals. With Pakistan slipping to a loss, India’s campaign also came to an end.
Sadia Iqbal, Omaima Sohail, Nashra Sandhu, Nida Dar and Syeda Aroob Shah bowled incisively, extracting a fair amount of side-spin. Unfortunately, their fielders couldn’t hold onto the catches. In the sixth over itself, Suzie Bates was dropped by Nashra off Omaima.
A couple of overs later, Omaima herself dropped a catch off her own bowling. Amelia Kerr was the one who got the reprieve. Some overs later, Nida was at the receiving end of all those grassed chances, with Sidra Amin dropping one. Incredibly, three more easy opportunities were not taken in the final over. Nida was once more the unlucky bowler. The anguish on her face said it all. In between, Nashra herself saw a catch go down off her bowling.
For New Zealand, Bates top-scored with 28. It was her opening stand of 41 with Georgia Plimmer that laid the platform for the win. Brooke Halliday’s 24-ball 22 and Sophie Devine’s 25-ball 19 also turned out to be handy contributions. Amelia and Eden Carson, the spin duo, then took five wickets between them. The seamers and Fran Jones also chipped in with wickets.
On a very slow pitch, it was always going to be a challenging task for Pakistan. Their batters tried to score quickly with an eye on NRR, resulting in regular fall of wickets. Fatima Sana (21), the skipper, was the only Pakistan batter who was able to negotiate the conditions with a degree of confidence. She was the ninth batter dismissed. Soon, Pakistan were bundled out in the 12th over.
Brief Scores: New Zealand 110/6 in 20 overs (Suzie Bates 28; Nashra Sandhu 3-18) beat Pakistan 56 in 11.4 overs (Fatima Sana 21; Amelia Kerr 3-14) by 54 runs.