Pakistan took a heavy dip as they lost against West Indies and England, bringing them down the table and disqualifying them for the semi-finals. This helped England to proceed to the semi-finals with zero losses. Sri- Lanka also dropped down a few ranks after losing to New Zealand last Sunday. India and South Africa advanced to the Semi-Finals after beating Ireland and Bangladesh respectively.
The Semi-finals took off last Thursday with a match against India and Australia. Australia won the match with five runs. The Aussies started the first innings and hit a total of 172 for four. India faced some troubles with dropping some catches that would have helped them win the match. Harmanpreet Kaur’s half-century did help India gain ground against Australia, but the efforts did come in vain. The team in yellow claimed victory and went on to gain their fifth win of the tournament advancing them to the finals.
The second semi-final match was held last Friday with South Africa facing England. South Africa took to the home pitch and won the match with six runs. The South African team started the first innings of the match, scoring a total of 164 runs for six wickets. Once England took to the field, the powerful team was caught off-guard by the bowling from the South African team. Shabnam Ismail from SA had a whopping three-wicket haul along with Ayabonga Khaka who took down four wickets.
This left Australia to face South Africa in the Final match this Sunday in Cape Town. The match commenced at 1 PM GMT, with Australia winning the toss and choosing to bat. Australia completed 156 runs for six wickets, with a stellar innings from Beth Mooney. Mooney allowed Australia to be able to cross the 150-run mark with the 74 runs she achieved. South Africa took to the pitch and were unable to keep up with the pace that Australia had set. Laura Wolvaardt hit a total of 61 runs, but it wasn’t enough for them to catch up to the score that was set. Australia finally won the match by a total of 19 runs.
This amounted to the sixth win for the Australian side, who continue to dominate the format.
