While the Indian men’s cricket team is struggling on the bouncy Cape Town track against South Africa, Indian women are setting new milestones in the BCCI’s Senior Women’s Cricket Challenger Trophy. In a match against the Smriti Mandhana-led India Blue, opener Poonam Raut smashed a magnificent hundred and led her team, India Green, to victory.
India Blue won the toss and invited the Greens to bat first. Poonam Raut and India’s teenage sensation Jemimah Rodrigues opened the innings and provided a very good start to the team. The opening duo added a total of 112 runs in 26 overs before Rodrigues lost her wicket just after scoring her yet another fifty in this tournament.
#JemimahRodrigues 2nd fifty in this tournament. #ChallengerTrophy #IndBluevIndGreen pic.twitter.com/BRE670q0z1
— SuperStar (@AdwinFurtado) January 6, 2018
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Thereafter, India Greens lost two more wickets in five overs, and were reduced to 119/3. While batting alongside skipper Anuja Patil, Rout batted patiently and smashed a century. She scored a total of 101 runs off 125 balls and hit 10 boundaries. Unfortunately, the innings came to an end in the 43rd over as she was dismissed LBW by Radha Yadav.
Here’s how Rout got her hundred:
The Moment @raut_punam Reached his Century. #ChallengerTrophy #IndBluevIndGreen #PunamRaut pic.twitter.com/EEZAgAkt8t
— SuperStar (@AdwinFurtado) January 6, 2018
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Anuja Patil scored 44 off 51 balls while India Green put a total of 232 runs after losing 8 wickets. In return, the Smriti Mandhana-led India Blue could only score 196 runs after losing 7 wickets and lost the game by 36 runs.
Both the teams are scheduled to play their next game against each other on January 8.
Jemimah Rodrigues reflects on her knocks in @paytm #ChallengerTrophy and her career thus far – https://t.co/kG8JV1fZFA
— BCCI Women (@BCCIWomen) January 6, 2018
For the second time in the tournament, Raut and Rodrigues played a vital role in their team’s victory. In their last game against India Red, they both scored their respective half-centuries. Both the openers smashed 84 runs each and helped their team winning the match by 8 wickets.
