Mumbai, Nov 3: India’s women finally captured their first-ever ICC World Cup title with a thrilling 52-run win over South Africa at the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai on Sunday.Powered by Shafali Verma’s aggressive 87 and Deepti Sharma’s composed all-round show, Harmanpreet Kaur’s team ended decades of heartbreak to become ODI world champions.
A confident start saw India post 298/7, with a record 104-run opening partnership between Smriti Mandhana and Shafali Verma.
Shafali, after a lean run, silenced critics by hitting the youngest-ever World Cup fifty. Deepti Sharma steadied the innings with a crucial 58, while Richa Ghosh smashed a quick 34 for a late surge.
Chasing 299, South Africa rode on Wolvaardt’s fighting hundred, but regular breakthroughs from Shafali and Deepti halted their charge. Deepti emerged as the hero with a five-wicket haul, sealing India’s emphatic triumph and sparking scenes of national pride and celebration.
Harmanpreet Kaur, Indian skipper, said, I I’m so grateful for this crowd. They’ve been so amazing. Thank you, thank you, guys, for being there for us, for in all our ups and downs. And credit goes to our entire cricket team, BCCI, selectors, everyone back home, thank you, thank you so much. (how did you motivate the team after three successive losses?) Last game also we spoke, that self-belief was there that, you know, even though we lost three back-to-back games, but we knew this team had something special to turn things around the table. So I think credit goes to each and every member. They stayed positive. They knew what we have to do in the next three games. And I think everybody was so involved. They were there for day and night. I think this team deserves to be there. (on bringing on Shafali) I mean, when Laura and Sune was batting, they were looking really good. And I just saw Shefali standing there. And the way she was batting today, I knew today’s her day. She was showing something special today. And I just thought I have to go with my gut feeling. If my heart is saying I could give at least one over to her, I’m going to give her. And then I just asked her, can you bowl one over? And she was so ready. And she always wanted to bowl for the team. And I think that was a turning point for us. When she came to the team, that time we spoke to her, we might need to bowl two or three overs. Then she was like, no, if you give me the ball, I’m going to bowl 10 overs for the team. And that showed how confident she was to bowl for the team. And I think credit goes to her, she was so positive. She was there for the team. (was 298 enough did you think?) No, actually today’s pitch was totally different because of the rain and the overhead condition. We knew this total is enough for the final game because in the final game, you always have a little extra pressure on you. But still, we should give credit to the South Africa team. They batted beautifully.
Laura Wolvaardt, SA captain, said, All of those words. I couldn’t be prouder of this team for the campaign that we have had. Played some brilliant cricket throughout. Outplayed today, India played fantastically well. Unfortunate to be on the losing side today, but I’m sure we’ll definitely grow from this as a group. (how did you recover after the opening loss and the loss to Australia?) I think we did so well to put those couple of bad games behind us. We were either really good or really bad, but thankfully there was a lot more really good throughout this tournament. Yeah, I think there were so many different players stepping up. Amazing tournament for a lot of different players. And just proud of the resilience we showed to get all the way to the final. (how did you balance batting and captaincy?) I probably didn’t have my best year leading into this World Cup, and probably didn’t start the tournament that well. But I think maybe overthinking it wasn’t that good. Just try to, you know, it’s just another game of cricket even though you are at a World Cup