Women in blue thrashes Barbados as they reach final four of CWG

India have reached the semifinal of Commonwealth Games 2022 as they beat Barbados by 100 runs in their last group game at Edgbaston, Birmingham. The game was a do-or-die situation for both the teams to make it to the final four. 

Barbados elected to bowl first after winning the toss and had a great start with the ball in hand as they dismissed in form Smriti Mandhana cheaply in just the 2nd over. Shafali Verma was then joined by Jemimah Rodrigues as they both recovered the early damage pretty well.

Both put up a 71-run stand for the 2nd wicket before Shafali missed out on a half-century as she was run out on 43. Skipper Harmanpreet was very quick to head back to the pavilion as she was removed in her very first ball by Shakera Selman.

Taniya Bhatia also couldn't do much and was dismissed for 6 runs as India looked struggling at 92/4 after 13 overs. All-rounder Deepti Sharma then came to join Jemimah and both started getting runs sensibly as the latter went on to score her half-century.

They both added 70 runs together for the 5th wicket and took their team to a promising total of 162/4 in their 20 overs. Jemimah remained unbeaten on 56 runs whereas Deepti scored 34 runs off 28 balls. Shakera, Aaliyah, and Shanika took one wicket each for the Barbados with the ball. 

Chasing the target, Barbados had a horrible start to their inning as Deandra Dottin was dismissed by Renuka Singh in the 3rd ball of the inning with nothing on the scoreboard.  Renuka once again looked lethal with the new ball as she rattled through the Barbados batting lineup.

They never looked on track and kept losing wickets at regular intervals. The women in blue restricted their opponents on 62/8 in their 20 overs to clinch the fixture by a huge margin of 100 runs.

Renuka was unplayable as she gave away just 10 runs in her quota of 4 overs and took 4 wickets. She was well supported by Meghna Singh and Sneh Rana who took one wicket each whereas Radha Yadav and skipper Harmanpreet found a single scalp each.

India have made it to the semifinals along with Australia, New Zealand, and England after winning their last group game.