Today, June 24th 2017 the ICC Women’s World Cup started with two games being played. The 1st match featured New Zealand and Sri Lanka at Bristol and the 2nd match involved England and India at Derby.
New Zealand started their tournament on a winning note after they defeated Sri Lanka by 9 wickets. The major keys to the New Zealand’s victory were Suzie Bates who scored a remarkable hundred and Holly Huddleston’s brilliant bowling picking up five wickets. The Sri Lankans scorecard wasn’t to impressive as their batting failed miserably.
At the toss, New Zealand won and decided to have a field first. Sri Lanka didn’t get off to a bad start, Chamari Atapattu and Chamari Polgampola had a second wicket partnership of 92 runs before they lost their second wicket. With remarkable fielding from Suzie Bates, Atapattu was dismissed for a well played 53 runs including 7 4s, Sri Lanka 141 -2. From here on the New Zealand bowlers demolished the Sri Lankans batting lineup. Medium-pacer Holly Huddleston was the star with the ball for New Zealand who picked up he 3rd 5-wicket haul in ODIs, was truly awesome to watch, she ended with figure s of 35-5 from her 10 overs. The Sri Lankan put up a pretty small total ending on 188-9 from their 50 overs.
New Zealand successfully got to their target very comfortably with the combination of Suzie Bates and Amy Satterthwaite who punished the Sri Lankan bowlers. Both remained not out at the end of the innings, Bates 106 including 11 4s and Satterthwaite 78 including 7 4s. New Zealand got to their target in 37.4 overs.
So remarkable to note that Sri Lanka have never defeated New Zealand in their past nine ODI encounters. Great win for New Zealand .
