16-year-old Shafali has been exceptional with the bat at the ongoing ICC Women’s T20 World Cup in Australia. Shafali’s explosive batting at the top of the order saw her score 161 runs in four innings.
Melbourne: India's Shafali Verma in action during the ICC Women's T20 World Cup 9th match between India and New Zealand at Junction Oval in Melbourne on Feb 27, 2020. (Photo: Twitter/@T20WorldCup)
India’s teenage prodigy Shafali Verma surpassed New Zealand’s Suzie Bates to take over the numero uno spot in Women’s T20 batter rankings.
Bates had been the helm of affairs since October 2018 after wresting the spot from West Indies captain Stafanie Taylor.
Meanwhile, Shafali’s opening partner Smriti Mandhana has gone down by two spots and is currently placed at the sixth position. Jemimah Rodrigues has also made a slip of two spots and finds herself at the ninth position in the latest rankings.
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16-year-old Shafali has been exceptional with the bat at the ongoing ICC Women’s T20 World Cup in Australia. Shafali’s explosive batting at the top of the order saw her score 161 runs in four innings.
In the opening match of the biennial event, the right-handed batter scored 29 runs off 15 balls to give India a blazing start in a match they won by 17 runs. The teenager was once again the cynosure of all eyes against Bangladesh as she smashed a 17-ball 39, including four sixes.
In India’s third match, Shafali scored 46 runs off 34 balls and followed it with a 47 off 34 against Sri Lanka on Saturday.
The swashbuckling opener has now hit nine sixes at the ongoing biennial event and stands one hit shy of levelling her captain Harmanpreet Kaur’s record of most sixes in a single edition of the T20 World Cup.
Shafali has played a key role in India’s semifinal entry. The Women in Blue will be facing England on Thursday in the first semifinal while Australia will play against South Africa on the same date.
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