Following India’s victory against Bangladesh in the Women’s T20 World Cup in Manchester on Thursday, skipper Harmanpreet Kaur acknowledged that her team needs to improve its fielding after dropping four catches in its most recent match, but she encouraged her players to recover.
Harmanpreet was pleased with India’s overall effort even though they had intended to complete the chase of 137 sooner. Instead, they finished the match in 16.5 overs.
“We’ve worked on our fielding but we dropped catches. They are our best fielders, but sometimes it happens. We just need to keep working and keep catching balls so we get into good positions. We have fumbled, but hopefully we show our best next game,” PTI quoted Harmanpreet as saying after the match.
The captain of India stated that the squad was anticipating a difficult match against Australia, characterizing them as one of the best rivals and a team that a win would significantly improve.
“All set for Australia, one of our best oppositions. We know in these tournaments when every game is a must-win, you have to give your best. We’ll get a lot of confidence if we win that,” she said.
Harmanpreet also mentioned India’s victory in the ODI World Cup in Navi Mumbai last year, claiming that the outcome had given the team more self-assurance and enabled them to overcome obstacles.
Shafali Verma, the opener who won Player of the Match for her aggressive 34-ball 53, expressed satisfaction with her strategy and supported her capacity to find boundaries against loose deliveries.
“Very happy with the way I batted. Good confidence. I just tried to hit boundaries off bad balls, nothing different. I tried to choose the right ball to go big and take a single if not,” Shafali said.
But after missing out on a longer innings, the right-hander acknowledged that she was disappointed. Shafali continued by saying that she is still prepared to contribute with the ball when needed.
“I used to bowl with the new and old ball in the nets. I’m there to do whatever the team needs. Thanks to Harman di for giving me good fields and confidence.”
Nigar Sultana, the captain of Bangladesh, thought her team was 15–20 runs short despite creating opportunities.
“We created a lot of chances but couldn’t grab them, so India took the game away. We bowled well. We were 15-20 runs short. We got a good powerplay but couldn’t carry on,” she said.
