Women’s T20 Challenge: Velocity beat Supernovas in final-over thriller

Velocity exacted
revenge on the Supernovas, who beat them twice last season, with a five-wicket
win in the inaugural fixture of the 2020 Women’s T20 Challenge the Sharjah
Cricket Stadium on Wednesday.

Supernovas
won their second consecutive title last year with a four-wicket win over Velocity
following a final-over thriller.

Invited to bat, the Harmanpreet Kaur-led side only
managed to put up a modest total of 126 for the loss of eight wickets. Last
year’s player of the tournament Jemimah Rodrigues (7) could not perform well with the bat, falling to Ekta Bisht, who took three wickets.

Velocity’s
Bangladeshi pacer Jahanara Alam took the key wickets of Chamari Athapaththu (44
from 39) and skipper Kaur (31 from 27) to curb the scoring. A flurry of wickets
towards the end saw the Supernovas’ innings peter out for a below-par total.

Velocity
got off to a wobbly start to the chase, losing both openers and skipper Mithali
Raj with just 38 runs on the board. However, the middle order clicked, as a 51-run
partnership between Sushma Verma (34 from 33) and Sune Luus (37* from 21) after
a handy 29-run knock from Veda Krishnamurthy, helped secure the win.

Luus, a South
African international, was adjudged player-of-the-match for her unbeaten knock.

Velocity
will have a very short period of recovery, as they play Smriti Mandhana’s
Trailblazers in Thursday’s early fixture, before the Mumbai Indians take on the
Delhi Capitals in the first playoff in the Indian Premier League later in the
day.

The
Supernovas will next be in action on November 7, when they face the Trailblazers
before the November 9  final.