Smriti Mandhana, India’s stand-in T20I captain, termed the last-ball defeat in the second match of the series against South Africa this Sunday as “a bitter pill to swallow”.
The visitors came out triumphant in a close-fought encounter and sealed the series 2-0 – their first series win over India women in the T20I format.
Quite a bitter pill to swallow because it was our game for 80 percent of the time and we couldn’t pull it back in the last minute. There are a lot of things to learn from the game,
Mandhana said after the game at the post-match presentation ceremony.
An issue that let India down in Lucknow was their fielding as they dropped Lizelle Lee, who top-scored with 70 off 45 balls, three times during her knock in the second T20I. Richa Gosh was guilty of the drops twice, while Rajeshwari Gayakwad spilt one chance.
The way we fielded, we probably didn’t deserve to win the game. We’ll keep working on our fielding,
said Mandhana.
Pressure no excuse for Indian bowlers: Smriti Mandhana
Look past the fielding errors, and India actually had a decent outing with the bat as they made a total of 158/4 in the first half. Shafali Verma provided the innings with a solid start by smashing 47 runs off 31 balls before Richa Gosh’s late blitz saw her make an unbeaten 44 off 26 balls and took India past the 150-mark.
The way our batters batted was amazing to watch. The way they built partnerships and got us over 150, it was a good total to defend. We needed to do better in the second half of the game.
said Mandhana.
While pleased with the batting effort, Mandhana was slightly critical of her team’s bowling unit. The hosts failed to put the breakers on visiting batters and conceded the 159-run target at the end to lose the series.
The pressure of defending the score may have got to the Indian attack, but Mandhana said there couldn’t be any excuses on that front.
We cannot keep using that (extra pressure) as an excuse. We need to get better and hopefully, there will be one match where they get it right,
the skipper signed off.
India had lost the opening encounter by eight wickets on Saturday (March 20). The third and final match of the T20I series will be played on Tuesday (March 23).
