Home ›› 01 Aug 2022 ›› Sport
India win by eight wickets over archrivals Pakistan in the group A match of Birmingham Commonwealth Games on Sunday.
As India and Pakistan are not exchanging bilateral tours due to political turmoil, the archrivals only meet each other in global stages.
When the draw assured that India and Pakistan will meet in the Women’s T20 event at Birmingham, the expatriate Indians and Pakistanis were elated and the tickets of the match at Edgbaston get sold quickly.
Indian opener Smriti Mandhana played a brilliant knock of 63* runs from 42 balls to take her side home against Pakistan.
Pakistan’s captain Bismah Maroof won the toss and decided to bat first. Renuka Singh started with a maiden over, a rare scene in T20, and then Meghna Singh dismissed Pakistan’s opener, Iram Javed, for a duck.
Bismah came to the crease as the one-down batter and formed a 50-run partnership with Muneeba Ali but after she got out Pakistan lost the way. Pakistan lost Muneeba and Bismah in the same over, off-spinner Sneh Rana did the damage.
Three run-outs and lack of partnerships hurt Pakistan badly as they were all-out for just 99 runs in 18 overs.
Sneh Rana and Radha Yadav each bagged two; Renuka Singh, Meghna Singh, and Shefali Verma took one wicket each.
Chasing 100 to win, Mandhana guided the team to victory with a half-century while Shefali Verma scored 16 runs and Sabbhineni Meghana scored 14 runs.
Omaima Sahil and Tuba Hasan took wickets for Pakistan.
India chased down the target in just 11.4 overs with 38 balls to spare and eight wickets in hand.
The win took India to the top of the table in group 1 while Pakistan is getting out of the race for gold in the Commonwealth Games cricket event.
Pakistan lost to Barbados in their first match against Barbados, and now lying at the bottom of the table without any points.
