LONDON (AP) — South Africa has done its part, confirming India must beat Australia at Lord’s to qualify for Sunday’s Women’s Twenty20 World Cup semi-final.
On the final day of the group stage, ODI world champions India and last two T20 World Cup finalists South Africa were battling it out for the fourth and final semi-final spot. Undefeated Australia made it through the group without incident, barring a major meltdown.
South Africa struggled to defeat Bangladesh by four wickets in the first match of the road double header.
India were still ahead of South Africa in terms of net run rate, but needed to beat Australia in the afternoon to overtake South Africa in the standings.
Coincidentally, both teams’ best batsmen were out on the first ball of each innings. Juairiya Ferdous swung Marizanne Kapp but missed, giving the South African pacer his 100th T20 wicket. South Africa captain Laura Wolvaardt was bowled between her bat and pad by Marfa Akhter. The first pair of ducks happened only once, in the 2018 T20 World Cup, between Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.
Bangladesh opted to bat and managed just 117 wins and 5 losses in front of quality bowling from Kapp (1 win, 9 losses), Shabnim Ismail (1 win, 15 losses) and Nonkhululeko Mlaba (2 wins, 22 losses).
Sobhana Mostari led the Bangladeshi national team with 42 points, while captain Nigar Sultana was the team’s top scorer in the tournament with 32 points, just 20 points shy.
Annelie Derksen and Tazmin Blitz gave South Africa a good start, but wickets fell with such regularity that the chasers were sweating. Dexen fell behind in the 15th over, Kapp was out in the 18th over and Nadine de Klerk fell in the 19th over. Chloe Tryon clinched the victory with two missed shots.
“As we always seem to do, we won,” Cupp said. “A win is a win, even if it’s very rough.”
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