Top(class)-order: India ride on top-order show to beat Bangladesh by 59 runs

Sylhet, October 8

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Shafali Verma silenced her critics with a brilliant 55 off 44 balls as India beat Bangladesh by 59 runs to win their fourth match and clinch a semifinals spot in the Women’s Asia Cup here today.

After a below-par batting show against Pakistan, India put up a much-improved performance by scoring 159/5. If the 96-run opening stand between Verma and stand-in skipper Smriti Mandhana (47 off 38) was the bedrock of the performance, Jemimah Rodrigues’ 35 not out off 24 balls played a crucial role in providing India’s innings a big push.

In reply, Bangladesh could manage only 100/7 in 20 overs and never looked like being in the hunt for a victory.

With eight points from five games, India top the seven-team table with a match left in the round-robin stage.

Having never chased a total beyond 142 in T20 cricket, Bangladesh did give it a go but could never take the game to a solid Indian bowling attack which kept things tight. After a shoddy fielding effort against Pakistan, the team showed improvement as there were no easy runs in the store for the hosts — Bangladesh couldn’t even score 50 in the first 10 overs.

None of the Indian bowlers faltered, with Sneh Rana (1/17) and Deepti Sharma (2/13) being parsimonious as ever. Even Verma’s loopy leg-breaks (2/10) seemed unplayable. The slowness of the track also meant that the spinners could vary the pace and most of the balls were not coming onto the bat. The two openers — Fargana Hoque (30 off 40) and Murshida Khatun (21 off 25) — could add only 45 in the first nine overs, and Bangladesh were effectively out of the contest by then.

“It was disappointing in the last match (versus Pakistan). It’s good to comeback after that loss,” Mandhana said.

Brief scores: India: 159/5 in 20 overs (Verma 55, Rodrigues 35*; Ahmed 3/27) vs Bangladesh: 100/7 in 20 overs (Sultana 36; Verma 2/10, Sharma 2/13). — PTI

Just for the record

Sylhet: India’s teenage batting sensation Shafali Verma made history as she became the youngest woman cricketer to reach 1,000 T20I runs with her sensational knock against Bangladesh. Verma reached the milestone aged 18 years and 253 days, surpassing Jemimah Rodrigues, who was 21 years and 32 days old when she completed 1,000 runs during a game against Australia in October last year. Verma also became the fifth Indian to enter the 1,000-plus club in T20Is after Rodrigues, Mithali Raj, Smriti Mandhana and Harmanpreet Kaur.