England captain Heather Knight spoke about her team’s rout against India at the DY Patil Stadium. She cited “extreme conditions” as the reason behind the team’s defeat.
indian women They were all over England in the single test. The Harmanpreet Kaur-led team defeated the opposition by a huge margin of 347 runs as they showed amazing effort with both bat and ball.
Opting to bat first, India Women thanks to the crucial contributions of Shubha Satheesh (69), Jemimah Rodrigues (68), Harmanpreet Kaur (49), Deepti Sharma (67) and Yastika Bhatia (66) registered a mammoth first innings total of 428 runs on the board.
However, after that, Deepti Sharma spun the net around the English batsmen and took a five-wicket haul. Her bravery with the ball helped India edge out the England women by just 136 runs. Those led by Harmanpreet Kaur then extended their lead and declared their innings at 186 runs.
The Indian spinners once again outscored the batsmen as they castled them for 131 runs to win the match by 347 runs. Deepti Sharma was once again a star with the ball as she picked 4 wickets and was declared Player of the Match for her exceptional performance.
England captain Heather Knight was not at all convinced by the conditions and said she had never seen so much change. Speaking of the conditions, she explained:
“These conditions were really extreme; We’ve never seen that kind of turn before, that kind of dryness on the field. In the main formats we play (T20 and 50 overs) we are not going to achieve as much. [turn] how that.
“Previously, our issues against misrepresentation were more [around] the ball does not spin. If you looked at the wickets that Ash Gardner took in the Ashes, there weren’t many that were spinning. My dismissal spun, but a lot of things were off the outside edge and balls that didn’t spin.”
IND-W vs. ENG-W: I would be surprised if we faced those conditions again – Heather Knight
Heather Knight said she would be surprised if they saw those conditions again. She hoped that these circumstances would not arise in the T20 World Cup in Bangladesh.
The England captain also mentioned that the pitch deteriorated after the first innings. She explained:
“These conditions were extreme and I would be surprised if we faced them again unless we play another Test in India in the near future, which I am not sure is in the plan. We want to improve the conditions we could face in Bangladesh. The spin dominates in women’s football and if we can improve it, it will give us a big advantage.
“[The pitch] It probably deteriorated a little faster than we expected. [It was] reasonably well in the first innings to keep batting. The twist was quite extreme. We played pretty well on the first day with two wickets. Some nicks they didn’t take, which can destroy the soul of some of those fast bowlers when their best ball doesn’t hit the slips.”
English women will leave India with great confidence. Apart from the Test they lost, they won the three-match T20I series 2-1, which was an ideal preparation for the T20 World Cup.
