Chennai. Puja Vastrakar and Radha Yadav led the bowling attack with a superb performance as India defeated South Africa by 10 wickets with 55 balls to spare in the third and final women’s T20 International cricket match to level the three-match series 1-1.
Fast bowler Vastrakar (4 wickets for 13 runs) bowled the best in his career by taking four wickets while left-arm spinner Radha (3 wickets for 6 runs) took three wickets, due to which South Africa’s team collapsed for 84 runs in 17.1 overs. India registered an easy win by scoring 88 runs without any loss in 10.5 overs. Smriti Mandhana remained unbeaten by scoring 54 runs in 40 balls and Shefali Verma remained unbeaten by scoring 27 runs in 25 balls.
South Africa won the first match by 12 runs while the second match could not be completed due to rain. India had earlier won the only Test match apart from winning the ODI series 3-0. Mandhana started by hitting two fours on Ayobanga Khaka. After this, both the Indian batsmen scored runs easily. India scored 40 runs in the power play. After this, Mandhana completely dominated the South African bowlers.
Mandhana completed her half-century by hitting two fours and a winning six off Nadine de Klerk. She hit 8 fours and two sixes in her innings. Shefali hit three fours in her innings. She also got a lifeline when she was on 24 runs. Earlier, apart from Vastrakar and Radha, Arundhati Reddy (one wicket for 14 runs), Shreyanka Patil (one wicket for 19 runs) and Deepti Sharma (one wicket for 20 runs) took one wicket each from India. From South Africa, only opener Tejmin Brits (20) could touch the 20-run mark.
India won the toss and invited South Africa to bat, after which the team lost the wickets of captain Laura Wolvaardt (09) and Marijne Kapp (10) and added 39 runs in the power play. Wolvaardt completed six thousand runs in international cricket with a four in the very first over of Vastrakar. Wolvaardt and Brits also hit fours on Sanjeevan Sanjana. Off-spinner Shreyanka gave India the first success by getting Wolvaardt caught by Arundhati.
Kapp hit two fours in Shreyanka’s over but got caught by Shefali Verma at midwicket in Vastrakar’s next over and became the 50th victim of this fast bowler. Brits hit two more fours on Shreyanka but in an attempt to play a big shot on off-spinner Deepti’s ball, she played a shot in the air and captain Harmanpreet Kaur ended her innings by taking a brilliant catch at mid-off.
Anneke Bosch and Chloe Troyon then took the innings forward. Both of them completed the team’s half-century in the 10th over.
Vastrakar gave South Africa their fourth blow by trapping Bosch (17) leg before wicket. Two balls later Nadine de Klerk (00) also played Vastrakar’s ball onto the wickets, taking South Africa’s score to 61 for five wickets.
Radha dismissed Anneri Dirksen (02), Sinalo Jafta (08) and Nonkululeko Mlaba (00) while Arundhati ended the innings of Troyon (08). Vastrakar ended South Africa’s innings by having Elise Marie Marks (07) caught by wicketkeeper Uma Chhetri.