Renuka focuses on Sunday’s big prize after starring in Asia Cup semi-final
Seven-time champions India lived up to their billing in the ongoing women’s Asia Cup by reaching a ninth-straight final where they will take on hosts Sri Lanka on Sunday.
India’s ODI skipper Mithali Raj expressed her disappointment after England won the last One Day International match of three-match series against Women-in-Blue to avoid the whitewash. Raj, who is also the leading run getter in Women’s ODI, however, insisted that the 2-1 win over the current world champions would act as a huge confidence booster for her side.
“Well, it does play a very important part because, obviously we are not playing Pakistan and we just have one more team that we are still to play, the West Indies,” Raj said while speaking about ICC Women’s Champions at the end of third ODI.
Mithali also further explained that India now has only the contest against the West Indies to look for after having lost two points each against Sri Lanka, South Africa and also in New Zealand.
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“So pretty much in totality we lost eight points when we were in a position to grab those 2 points in all those series. So it is disappointing but winning against one of the quality sides with full strength gives lot of confidence to this side,” Mithali said, before adding, “Only in New Zealand, we felt it was a one-sided game in the third ODI. But it was a well fought match against Sri Lanka, which went till the last over and also in South Africa when we played South Africa, so those matches were well fought.”
The 35-year-old Indian captain also defended her decision to drop Ekta Bisht, the player of the match in the first ODI, for Rajeshwari Gayakwad.
“We only made one change in the team, getting Rajeshwari in place of Ekta Bist. We felt that Rajashwari did not get a game even in New Zealand. Unfortunately this is a three ODI series so we can’t really try to give opportunity to too many youngsters. But she is a seasoned player and it is just unfortunate that she didn’t get a game in the New Zealand series, so we thought she needs to get a game here,” Mithali said.
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