By Asif Naveed
Sports Desk; India extended their winning streak against Pakistan in Women’s One-Day Internationals with a convincing 88-run victory at the R. Premadasa Stadium in Colombo.
With this win, India sit comfortably at the top of the points table with four points from two matches, followed by Australia with three points, and England with two.
Speaking at the post-match presentation, Pakistan captain Fatima Sana acknowledged her side’s shortcomings in the bowling department.
“In the starting powerplay we gave a lot of runs away. In the death overs we also gave up some extra runs,” she said. “If we had restricted them under 200, it would have been a good total, but we lost a couple of runs in the end.
I still believe today’s batting lineup was good. They are all pure batters in the top five, but they need to step up. We need long partnerships and to assess the conditions better. Sidra Amin is a key player in our team and very hardworking. Hopefully, she will perform well in the coming matches.”
India skipper Harmanpreet Kaur expressed her delight over the victory, calling it a crucial win. “Definitely very happy. Very important game for all of us. I’m sure everyone back home is happy.
The kind of bowling we bowled today, especially Kranti Goud, was outstanding. The spinners also contributed crucial breakthroughs. We created many chances, though we dropped a few. In the end, we’re happy,” she said.
She added that the pitch was challenging to bat on due to recent rain. “We just wanted to bat long and see how many runs we could get. Richa Ghosh’s 30 runs at the end were very important.
There are areas to improve, but we’re happy with this win and want to keep the momentum going. Now we go back to India where we know the pitches well, and we’ll continue to improve day by day.”
Pakistan, after two consecutive losses, are placed sixth on the table with zero points, while Bangladesh occupy fourth place behind England due to a lower net run rate.
