England opened the account of their victory in the tournament by defeating India by 4 wickets in the 15th match of the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup. Whereas the Indian team has to face the second defeat in the tournament. Earlier, New Zealand had defeated India by 62 runs.
England won the toss and decided to bowl first in the match. The Indian batsmen, who came to bat first, knelt in front of Charlotte Dean of England. With the help of Dean’s 4 wickets, England bundled out India for just 134 runs. In response, England won the match by scoring 136 for 6 wickets in 31.1 overs.
Smriti Mandhana scored 35 runs for India. Apart from Mandhana, Richa Ghosh scored 33 and Jhulan Goswami scored 20 runs. Harmanpreet returned to the pavilion after scoring 14 runs. For England, Charlotte Dean got 4, Shrubsole got two and Ecclestone, Cross got 1-1 wickets.
Chasing the target of 135 runs, England got off to a bad start. Meghna and Goswami sent the England openers to the pavilion. However, Natalie Sciver handled England’s innings with a quick run and scored 45 runs in 46 balls before being dismissed. During this he hit 8 fours. Captaincy Heather Knight played a brilliant half-century. For India, Meghna got three wickets, Jhulan, Gaikwad and Pooja got 1-1.
Due to this, the England team faced a strong Australia in their first match of the world, where they were defeated by Australia by 12 runs. West Indies beat West Indies by 7 runs in the second match. In the third match, South Africa defeated by 3 wickets. However, in all these three matches, England lost very close to victory.
The Mithali Raj-led Indian team started its campaign in the World Cup against arch-rivals Pakistan on 6 March. The team made a strong start by defeating Pakistan by 107 runs. However, in the second match itself, the batting of the Indian team was exposed and the team was defeated by New Zealand by 62 runs. In their last match, the Indian women’s team defeated West Indies by 155 runs to achieve a big victory. But by defeating India, England has once again given a big blow to the team’s campaign in the World Cup.