Chamari Atapattu broke a half century of rapid fire when the two-time champion Supernovas reached their third straight final with a narrow two-run victory over the Trailblazers in a last-ball thriller at the Women’s T20 Challenge here on Saturday.
After the last league game, all three teams finished with two points each, but Supernovas (-0.054) and Trailblazers (+2.109) qualified due to their better net rate than Velocity (-1.869) in the competition.
The Supernovae led by Harmanpreet Kaur will now face the Trailblazers led by Smriti Mandhana in Monday’s final.
Opting to hit, Atapattu laid the bases with an aggressive 67 of 48 balls, which was studded with five fours and four sixes. Harmanpreet then made some big shots (31 of 29) to bring the team to 146 of 6.
In response, Deepti Sharma (43 out) and Harleen Deol (27 of 15 balls) took the deep chase, but the Trailblazers were only able to get 144 of 5 in the end, courtesy of a superb last over left arm Radha Yadav (2 / 30).
For Supernovas, the spinners did a good job with Anuja Patil (1 of 18) and Radha drying runs in the middle, while mid-paced Shakera Selman picked up two wickets.
The pioneers got off to a good start in their chase with Deandra Dottin (27) and Mandhana (33) lifting 43 without losing in the first six overs. But Selman hit twice in the seventh more, first catching Dottin in front of the wicket and then clearing Richa Ghosh (4).
Deepti and Mandhana tried to repair the innings, but Anuja, who came in in place of Pooja Vastrakar, caught and threw the pattern at 13 to reduce the Trailblazers to 83 of 3. Deepti kept them in the chase, but the Trailblazers could only score seven of the 10 races required last time.
Earlier, Atapattu scored the top fifty of the competition and added 87 for the opening wicket with Priya Punia (30 of 37). However, Trailblazers spinners Harleen (1/34) and Salma Khatun (1/25) retired after 10 overs, giving away just 23 runs in the next five overs.
Atapattu racked up 14 runs in the 16 with a four and six, while Harmanpreet exploded in the 19, breaking a four and a six to rack up 15 runs and increase the total.
Left-handed starter Atapattu went for runs from the get-go and made her intentions clear with two limits in the second on innings thrown by Deepti Sharma. Later, in the fourth over, the Sri Lankan nonchalantly climbed one to the middle of the field for a six and then swept Deepti to mark a limit as the Supernovas racked up 15 runs.
Atapattu’s starting teammate Priya Punia, who came off the mark on her ninth ball, played second fiddle as the duo scored fifty on the power play. Priya, at 17, got a reprieve when Dottin dropped a catch in Rajeshwari Gaikwad’s bowling alley.
The two kept scoring at a fast pace and Atapattu was not afraid to throw high shots, while Priya also rotated the shot and also took three limits.
Priya fell as her attempt to clear the fence saw Deepti make an excellent catch running ahead of Khatun. He added 89 runs for the first wicket with Atapattu.
Atapattu reached his fifty in 37 installments with a powerful Harleen sweep. The Sri Lankan was eliminated by Hemalatha in front of Harleen’s delivery thrown in the 17. For the Trailblazers, the experienced Jhulan Goswami was the best bowler with figures of one for 17 of 4 overs, while Harleen and Khatun collected a wicket each. There were also three runs in the Supernova innings.
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