A massive week in the women’s sport this, with The Hundred, a tournament that’s produced some absolute thrillers, reaching its final week. And typically, it needed a nail-biter to decide the finale. Sadly, a couple of our MI girls ended up on the wrong side of the result, but let that not take anything away from how good they were in this last week, and indeed the entire tournament. Chalo Paltan, let’s dive right in..

The Hundred

Shabnim Ismail (Welsh Fire): She set the tone perfectly with the ball at the start, getting rid of the London Spirit skipper, Meg Lanning, cheaply in their chase of 116. And then returned later when Heather Knight and Danielle Gibson were cruising along to clean them both up and bring the Welsh Fire back on top. Alas, it wasn’t to be her day, with her 3/24 spell going in vain as Deepti Sharma smashed a six off the 98^th ball to bring the title home for London.

Hayley Matthews (Welsh Fire): Stellar with the ball all tournament, but the final is something she’d quickly like to forget. Giving away 34 runs in 18 balls, which included bowling a difficult final over, and a 26-ball 22 with the bat where she couldn’t quite get going, it was an off-day for our champ. In the last league game against Southern Brave, she was the Hero of the Match, breaking the back of the Brave batting with her four-fer, and then anchoring the chase with a 26-ball 35 to carry the Welsh Fire into the final.

Nat Sciver-Brunt (Trent Rockets): A disappointing end to what had been a super campaign for Aapli Nat. A duck in the final league game, which meant her side finished with a sub-par total, and thereby narrowly missed out on qualifying for the Eliminator.

Chloe Tryon (Southern Brave): She goes down fighting! A single-handed effort of 55 off just 38 balls against the Welsh Fire in their last league game, when the second-highest score in the team was 15.

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India A tour of Australia

Sajana Sajeevan and Saika Ishaque: In India A’s only win on the tour of Australia, both Sajana and Saika chipped in with useful cameos. Sajana’s 49-ball 40 gave India A some much-needed impetus in the middle-overs as they finished with a strong 243 on the board in their 50 overs. Saika then played her part in triggering Australia A’s collapse, in a spell of 4-0-13-1. All in all, it’s been a steep learning curve for both our girls, something that’s bound to hold them in good stead.