Here’s what Stand-in Skipper Smriti Mandhana has to say after India qualifies for semifinal of the ongoing Women’s Asia Cup 2022

India has been doing well in the ongoing Women’s Asia Cup 2022. They started pretty well after beating the likes of Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and the UAE to kick off their campaign. They registered a hat-trick of wins before the streak was broken by Pakistan on October 7. In a high-octane encounter, the Women In Blue lost the game by 13 runs. However, this hasn’t deterred the Indian team and they have now qualified for the semifinal.

They did so after beating Bangladesh 24 hours after the defeat against Pakistan. After the game, stand-in skipper Smriti Mandhana praised her team. She said that it was disappointing to lose the game against Pakistan but the team fought back well. Notably, Harmanpree Kaur, who is the regular captain sat out of the game due to a niggle.

“It was disappointing in the last match the way we played. We came back well. Really proud of the girls. Today it was a whole team performance. Shafali batted well at the start, Jemi did well in the end. I liked Deepti’s approach for those five balls. We were clinical as a bowling unit. We have to keep bowling dot balls and make them make mistakes. It is not easy for pace bowlers on this track to pick wickets. All of them actually bowled really well.”

India beat Bangladesh by 59 runs

Talking about the game, India won the toss and elected to bowl first. The decision proved right as openers, Mandhana and Shafali Varma stitched a partnership of 96 runs for the first wicket. The latter who has been out of form for a while made the best of the opportunity she got against Bangladesh Tigers. The team had a slowdown in the scoring rate and went on to score 159/5.

The score proved to be more than enough as the Green Brigade could only 100/7 at the end of the game. Shafali took two wickets in the game as well alongside Deepti Sharma.