Sharjah:After suffering a nine-wicket loss against Trailblazers, Velocity skipper Mithali Raj on Thursday said that she would have personally not wanted to depend on other teams to qualify for the finals of Women's T20 Challenge.
Sophie Ecclestone's four-wicket haul and Deandra Dottin's unbeaten 29-run knock of runs helped Trailblazers register a comfortable nine-wicket victory over Velocity on Thursday here at the Sharjah Cricket Stadium.
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Chasing just 48, Trailblazers lost their first wicket in the fourth over as Smriti Mandhana (6) was sent back to the pavilion by Leigh Kasperek. In the end, Deandra Dottin (29*) and Richa Ghosh (13*) took Trailblazers over the line by nine wickets with 73 balls to spare. With this loss, Velocity has to wait for the result of the Trailblazers-Supernovas match to qualify for the finals.
"All I could tell the bowlers was to stretch the game and bowl in a way where you can purchase wickets, it was one of those days which you would want to forget, having said we have come here to play I just wanted to give confidence to the girls to take a couple of wickets. I personally would not have wanted to depend on other teams to qualify for the final, but unfortunately, my team finds itself in that position, if Trailblazers beat Supernovas, then we stand a chance to qualify for the finals," said Mithali during the post-match press conference.
Velocity had won its opening match against Supernovas, but the side ended up losing against Trailblazers by a heavy margin, making their net run-rate go down considerably.
"Well, we carried the confidence from the last match, the middle order was very good in our last game, we thought the wicket was fresh and we did not want to take the pressure of chasing that is why we wanted to bat first. It was an afternoon game, there was no dew factor and the wicket was good so that is why we wanted to bat first and put up a good score on the board," said Mithali.
Earlier, an outstanding bowling performance from Sophie Ecclestone helped Trailblazers to bundle out Velocity for just 47 runs. In the end, Velocity was bowled out for 47 runs in the 16th over. For Trailblazers, Sophie Ecclestone took four wickets while Jhulan Goswami and Rajeshwari Gayakwad took two wickets each.
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"Clearly, that is the reason why she (Sophie) is the number one in the world, she has come up with her gameplan and she adjusted her line and length quickly, the new ball skids through and she made it difficult for the batters. Trailblazers have a good bowling attack, they have Jhulan Goswami and Sophie Ecclestone, both are very experienced and both provided them with breakthroughs, it has been difficult for the girls to play an afternoon game after playing an evening game last night," said Mithali.
