Our DC tigresses marched into the final of the Women’s Premier League 2024 after finishing as the table toppers of the league stages. In the last league game, our girls once again put on a dominating performance with the bat and the ball to beat Gujarat Giants by seven wickets. We are now all set to meet either Royal Challengers Bangalore and Mumbai Indians in the Final of WPL 2024.
Having lost the toss, Gujarat decided to bat first. Marizanne Kapp, the most prolific powerplay bowler in the tournament’s history, had another great start. She dismissed the in-form skipper of Gujarat, Beth Mooney, getting chopped on. The South African pacer also dismissed her national side teammate, Laura Wolvaardt in the 5th over to claim her second scalp which set GG on the backfoot.
Right before that though, Captain Lanning brought out a new trick out of her book by bringing in Jess Jonassen in the 4th over. The left-arm spinner did exactly what she was brought into the attack for, as she got rid of Dayalan Hemalatha. With three wickets down inside the powerplay, the opposition was obviously put under some pressure, which kept a tight rope on the scoreboard.
With 38 for 3 after eight over, Ashleigh Gardner was herself not looking the most fluent. In the end, it was a beautiful off-spinner by Minnu Mani which got to her stumps and bowled her. After the halfway stage, Phoebe Litchfield took the attack to Minnu smashing her for a six over long off. However, she tried to repeat the shot off the next ball and was caught out for 21.
With half a side gone with the score of 50 on the board, Kathryn Bryce and Bharati Fulmali got together and started to build a partnership. Their stand made sure Gujarat got past the three figure barrier. In the 19th over, Shikha Pandey got consecutive wickets dismissing Fulmali for 42 followed by Tanuja Kanwar for a duck.
There were a couple of run outs in the last over which made sure the score was limited to 126 for 9. Bryce stayed unbeaten on 28 while there were braces of wickets for Minnu, Kapp and Shikha.
Skipper Lanning didn’t spend too much time getting off to the start which our side needed. She smashed four boundaries in the second over. Shafali Verma also got into the act in the very next over, smashing three fours off Shabnam Shakil. The skipper got out soon to Kanwar, but before that she had made sure that the Orange Cap stayed on her head as the league stages concluded.
Kanwar also got the wicket of Alice Capsey for a duck, but once Jemimah came to the middle, things settled down for good. Shafali especially was at her fluent best smashing really good looking strokes. She dismissed anything which was a tad fuller and also went down the ground and hit straight as much as possible.
She hit Gardner for three sixes and a four in the space of her two overs. At the halfway stage, our score was poised at 82 for 2, with the DC girls being in the driving seat. Shafali’s fifty came off 29 balls when she launched Mannat Kashyap for a six over long off. She also took a great liking to Meghna Singh and got three fours and a six off her bowling to take us closer to the total.
With just a couple of runs left, Shafali was finally dismissed for 71 off 37 balls. Jemimah scored a four off the next ball to finish the run chase and stayed on 38 off 28 balls. Her knock also had four boundaries and one six.
Our next challenge is going to be the ultimate one. Delhi Capitals will be playing the Women’s Premier League final for the second time in a row and the aim will be to roar at the summit clash and bring glory home to Qila Kotla.
