It was not Smriti Mandhana, Harmanpreet Kaur or Jemimah Rodrigues, but the lower-order players who came to the fore, with the experienced all-rounder Deepti Sharma leading the charge. Of late, there had been too much reliance on the top order, with Mandhana doing the bulk of the work. Thus, it was a much-needed reality check and the lower order came up trumps to help India start their World Cup campaign convincingly.
For many years now, Agra-born Deepti has been the ‘go-to’ player whenever the team is in trouble and it was no different against Sri Lanka on Tuesday night. After she bailed out the team with a well-compiled half-century, she excelled with the ball too, picking up three wickets, including the crucial one of Sri Lanka captain Chamari Athapaththu, thus guiding the team to a commanding 59-run win after India seemed to be in trouble mid-way through their innings.
‘Lot of positives’
After bagging the Player of the Match award, Sharma said, “The first match always sets the tone, and there are a lot of positives from the match. Hopefully, in the rest of the tournament, we can keep performing this way and keep winning this way.”
Talking about her performance, she said, “There was no pressure at all because I am used to these types of innings and situations. I have played in such tight situations in the past, thus I do not feel pressure; I always enjoy my batting.”
On bowling in tandem with two other spinners Sneh Rana and N Charani, she said, “The things we had planned seeing the condition of the pitch and the strength of the Lankan batters, we executed them well. We knew we had to get through their top order and once we had the top three, they were always under pressure.”
Skipper Kaur pleased
Captain Harmanpreet Kaur reiterated the value of winning such an important opening match. “It was not an easy game. We know in ICC tournaments, every game is important and is going to be high-pressure,” she said. “The way Amanjot Kaur and Deepti handled the situation was outstanding to watch. I’m really happy all the girls came together to try to win this game for the country. Having [strong] batting until number seven is the biggest strength for us. Amanjot is someone who can contribute with both bat and ball for us and Deepti has been doing it for some time. This win has given us the right boost as we head for our next game,” added Kaur.