Monitoring Desk
ISLAMABAD/CAPE TOWN: England secured the top spot in Group B with a 114-run victory against Pakistan at Newlands on Tuesday to reach the semi final of the women’s T20 World Cup.
The English team scored a mammoth 213 for five – the highest total in Twenty-20 Women World Cup history – before restricting Pakistan to 99 for nine. Nat Sciver-Brunt, the tournament’s leading scorer, made an unbeaten 81 off 40 balls, with Danni Wyatt adding 59 off 33 and Amy Jones 47 off 31.
South Africa’s ten-wicket win against Bangladesh in the second game of Tuesday’s doubleheader means that England will lock horns with the hosts in the semi-final on Friday, while Australia and India will clash in the other semi on Thursday.
Nat Sciver-Brunt, Danni Wyatt lead England to a record WC total
Sciver-Brunt said “We have been building up to a performance like this.”
“We targeted this cricket game as a chance to show everyone as a team what we are about and to show off a bit.”
Meanwhile, Wyatt, who had suffered a frustratingly quiet tournament, with scores of 11, 16, and 0 before Tuesday’s cricket game, came out swinging this time. She smacked Sadia Iqbal’s 40 balls of the day through the covers, slogged the next over long on for six, and took a mere 29 balls to reach her fifty.
Sciver-Brunt coined the term “Jonball” in a post-match press conference at the start of this World Cup. She epitomized the philosophy (named after England head coach Jon Lewis), facing three dot balls in her innings.
“It is important for us to push ourselves and our standards higher and higher,” Sciver-Brunt said. “Everyone has bought into and believes the way we are playing would win us this tournament. If we can do this consistently, the globe is ours.”
Bismah Mahroof, the Pakistan skipper, who sustained a groin wound in the match against West Indies on Sunday, had to look on from the sidelines as her team crumbled without her guidance, looking clueless in the field, leaking runs and failing to appeal for a stumping against Jones in the 19th over despite the batter being out of her ground. They had five penalty runs awarded against them when a throw-in hit a glove discarded by keeper Sidra Nawaz.
