 "WPL 2024: Deepti's all-round show helps UP keep playoffs hopes alive")
In one of exciting matches of Women's Premier League 2024, UP Warriorz snatched victory from the jaws of defeat as Alyssa Healy's side snapped Delhi Capitals' five-match winning streak on Friday at Arun Jaitley Stadium in New Delhi. Deepti Sharma's all-round show and Grace Harris last over heroics tilted the game in UP's favours despite Delhi commanding show throughout the game.
With just 15 needed in 12 balls, Deepti Sharma took three wickets in the penultimate over and conceded only five runs. The task in hand for Grace Harris was even tougher, defending just 10 runs in the last over. And the situation gone worse when the first ball was misjudged by the fielder and the ball went for a six. On the next delivery, Radha Yadav collected a couple of runs and the equation was 2 needed off 4 deliveries.
With victory insight for Delhi, Grace Harris produced a delivery of life and got the wicket of Radha and then it was just comic of errors which saw Delhi losing three consecutive wickets, and finally losing the match by one run.
Earlier, Delhi Capitals were also off to a poor start as Shafali Varma got out in the 4th over with just 22 runs on board. Alice Capsey then joined Lanning in the middle. However, she was not able to strike the ball as she would have liked, thus Delhi managed only 35 in the powerplay.
Lanning, though, kept the run flow intact with some lusty blow. Capsey's struggle at the crease was finally ended in the 10th over as she tried to hit back-to-back maximum. She managed 15 runs off 23 balls as Sophie Ecclestone got rid of her.
The Delhi captain completed her 5th half-century of Women's Premier League before Deepti Sharma trapped her in the 14th over.
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Lanning now have the orange cap as she pipped Smriti Mandhana to be the highest run getter in WPL 2024.
| Delhi Capitals Women (T: 139 runs from 20 ovs) | |||||||
| BATTING | R | B | M | 4s | 6s | SR | |
| Meg Lanning (c) | lbw b Sharma | 60 | 46 | 55 | 12 | 0 | 130.43 |
| Shafali Verma | b Thakor | 15 | 12 | 14 | 2 | 0 | 125 |
| Alice Capsey | c Harris b Ecclestone | 15 | 23 | 27 | 1 | 1 | 65.21 |
| Jemimah Rodrigues | c Ecclestone b Thakor | 17 | 15 | 24 | 0 | 1 | 113.33 |
| Annabel Sutherland | b Sharma | 6 | 9 | 17 | 1 | 0 | 66.66 |
| Jess Jonassen | run out (Gayakwad/†Healy) | 11 | 5 | 17 | 1 | 1 | 220 |
| Arundhati Reddy | c Harris b Sharma | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Shikha Pandey | c & b Sharma | 4 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 200 |
| Radha Yadav | b Harris | 9 | 4 | 6 | 0 | 1 | 225 |
| Taniya Bhatia † | not out | 0 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Titas Sadhu | c sub (DN Wyatt) b Harris | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Extras | 0 | ||||||
| TOTAL | 19.5 Ov (RR: 6.90) | 137 | |||||
| BOWLING | O | M | R | W | ECON | 0s | 4s |
| Gouher Sultana | 3 | 0 | 29 | 0 | 9.66 | 7 | 6 |
| Saima Thakor | 4 | 0 | 30 | 2 | 7.5 | 13 | 4 |
| Sophie Ecclestone | 4 | 0 | 15 | 1 | 3.75 | 17 | 1 |
| Deepti Sharma | 4 | 0 | 19 | 4 | 4.75 | 14 | 3 |
| Tahlia McGrath | 2 | 0 | 19 | 0 | 9.5 | 3 | 1 |
| Rajeshwari Gayakwad | 2 | 0 | 17 | 0 | 8.5 | 4 | 3 |
| Grace Harris | 0.5 | 0 | 8 | 2 | 9.6 | 3 | 0 |
Opting to bat first, UP Warriorz didn't get a great start as Kiran Navgire was cleaned up by Titas Sadhu in the second over. Deepti Sharma then joined captain Alyssa Healy but both batters failed to capitalise on the field restrictions in the first few overs. But in the last three overs of the powerplay, Healy took matters into her own hands and hit some lusty blows, pushing the score to 44 in the first six overs.
However, Delhi stemmed the runflow with quick wickets of Healy and Tahila McGrath dented UP's scoring. While Healy went back to the pavilion in search of a big hit, Tahila failed to pick Arundhati Reddy off-cutter.
Australia's Grace Harris, who took the previous season by storm, failed to impress once again this season and managed only 14 runs off 12 deliveries.
Deepti, though, kept one intact as wickets kept tumbling from the other end. The senior Indian batter who has been scoring run-a-ball upped the ante in the death overs and pushed the score beyond the 130-run mark before getting out in the last over.
UP eventually managed to put a respectable 138 runs on board which was just enough for them to keep playoffs hopes alive and keep the WPL 2024 wide open.
| UP Warriorz Women (20 ovs maximum) | |||||||
| BATTING | R | B | M | 4s | 6s | SR | |
| Alyssa Healy (c)† | c Sutherland b Capsey | 29 | 30 | 36 | 5 | 0 | 96.66 |
| Kiran Navgire | b Sadhu | 5 | 5 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 100 |
| Deepti Sharma | c Reddy b Pandey | 59 | 48 | 75 | 6 | 1 | 122.91 |
| Tahlia McGrath | b Reddy | 3 | 4 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 75 |
| Grace Harris | c Jonassen b Yadav | 14 | 12 | 15 | 1 | 0 | 116.66 |
| Shweta Sehrawat | b Sadhu | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 133.33 |
| Poonam Khemnar | c & b Yadav | 1 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 25 |
| Sophie Ecclestone | st †Bhatia b Jonassen | 8 | 7 | 5 | 0 | 1 | 114.28 |
| Saima Thakor | not out | 5 | 7 | 12 | 0 | 0 | 71.42 |
| Gouher Sultana | not out | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 100 |
| Extras | (lb 2, nb 1, w 6) | 9 | |||||
| TOTAL | 20 Ov (RR: 6.90) | 138/8 | |||||
| BOWLING | O | M | R | W | ECON | 0s | 4s |
| Shikha Pandey | 4 | 0 | 34 | 1 | 8.5 | 9 | 2 |
| Titas Sadhu | 3 | 0 | 23 | 2 | 7.66 | 10 | 5 |
| Arundhati Reddy | 3 | 0 | 15 | 1 | 5 | 8 | 0 |
| Jess Jonassen | 4 | 0 | 31 | 1 | 7.75 | 9 | 3 |
| Annabel Sutherland | 2 | 0 | 12 | 0 | 6 | 6 | 2 |
| Radha Yadav | 3 | 0 | 16 | 2 | 5.33 | 8 | 2 |
| Alice Capsey | 1 | 0 | 5 | 1 | 5 | 1 | 0 |