India beat Nepal by 82 runs in the tenth match of the Women’s T20 Asia Cup to enter the semi-finals. India became the first team to reach the semi-finals. In this match, the Indian team had given Nepal a target of 179 runs on the strength of Shafali Verma’s stormy knock of 81 runs while batting first. In reply, Nepal continued to lose wickets and could manage only 96 runs in the allotted 20 overs.
With this defeat, Nepal is officially out of the tournament. In the group stage of Women’s Asia Cup 2024, Team India won all three matches to top Group A. Thus, India have secured their place in the semi-finals of the Asia Cup for the first time.
Chasing the target of 179 runs set by India in this match, the Nepal team lost 2 important wickets in just 21 runs. After this, captain Indu Burma and Sita Magar added 22 runs but both the set batsmen were dismissed in just 6 balls. Captain Indu scored 14 runs and Sita scored 18 runs. Therefore, Nepal team was in trouble by losing 4 wickets for 52 runs. The series of wickets started from here as the team lost the remaining 4 wickets in the next 40 runs. 7 batsmen of Nepal team could not even reach double figures.
In this match, the Indian team won the toss and came to bat first, scoring 178 runs for the loss of 3 wickets in 20 overs. Shafali Verma and Dayalan Hemlata gave the team a good start. Both of them shared a partnership of 122 runs for the first wicket. Hemalta was dismissed after scoring 47 runs off 42 balls. At the same time, Shafali scored her second fifty of the ongoing tournament in 26 balls. After this she was dismissed after scoring 81 runs off 48 balls. In between, she hit 12 fours and one six.
In this match against Nepal, Smriti Mandhana took charge of Team India. Because it was decided to rest the team’s regular captain Harmanpreet Kaur in this match. Actually, Harmanpreet Kaur was rested before the big matches to manage the tournament workload. Harmanpreet Kaur was seen leading the team in the first two matches of the group stage. Apart from her, Pooja Vastrakar was also not part of the playing eleven. She was also rested.
