Indian women’s cricket team skipper Harmanpreet Kaur can miss the Women’s T20 World Cup semifinal encounter against Australia due to illness, according to sources. All-rounder Pooja Vastrakar will not play the match due to upper respiratory tract infection. India qualified for the knockout stages of the competition with six points from four matches. While the Harmanpreet-led side was able to beat Pakistan, West Indies and Ireland, their only defeat came against Ireland. If Harmanpreet misses the match, vice-captain Smriti Mandhana is expected to lead the side. There were also some injury concerns over Radha Yadav who missed the match against Ireland.
“The Event Technical Committee of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2023 has approved Sneh Rana as a replacement for Pooja Vastrakar in the India squad,” ICC said in a statement on Thursday.
Ahead of the semi-final clash, Harmanpreet had pointed out some points of concern for Team India.
“We started really well but in the middle overs, we did not bowl according to plan and gave away too many runs. That is where we lost the momentum. We were doing well with the bat but did not get the run rate that we were looking for and that is why we lost wickets,” said Harmanpreet in the post-match presentation after the loss against England.
Harmanpreet also spoke in length about the number of dot balls faced by the Indian batters. India displayed some progress against Ireland with 41 dots in their innings of 155 for 6, powered by Smriti Mandhana’s T20I career-best score of 87, after facing 51 dot balls in their loss to England.
“World Cup games are always something where both the teams are always under pressure. I think these matches if 150 is on the board, you always [have] the upper hand. We are not putting too much pressure on ourselves. We are just going [out] there and understanding what conditions are there and just playing according to the situation. Dot balls are something which [are] already worrying us. In the next game, we would love to see some improvement in that area also,” Harmanpreet added.
(With PTI inputs)
Topics mentioned in this article