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Sri Lanka confirm Group A semi-final spot, Netherlands push for top finish in Group B
Tournament favourites, Sri Lanka, confirmed their ICC Women’s T20 World Cup Qualifier Group A semi-final spot with a dominant, 67-run victory over Uganda at Zayed Cricket Stadium in Abu Dhabi, while the Netherlands dashed Zimbabwe’s hopes of semi-final contention, with a hard-fought, 14-run win at Tolerance Oval in Wednesday’s afternoon matches.
Opener Vishmi Gunaratne (player of the match) and the Sri Lankan spinners were the stars for the table-toppers from Group A. Netherlands produced a solid, all-round performance with captain Babette de Leede, leading from the front and producing a player-of-the-match-winning performance with the bat in their crucial Group B encounter, which kept their semi-final hopes alive, while ending Zimbabwe’s.
Zimbabwe vs Netherlands
Opting to bat first, Netherlands lost key batter Iris Zwilling early to a direct hit at the non-striker’s end by Pellagia Mujaji, but Sterre Kalis and de Leede rebuilt with a watchful stand.
The partnership began slowly as Netherlands ambled to 29 in the first six overs. Kalis opened up with back-to-back fours off Josephine Nkomo and looked in ominous touch.
Sharne Mayers was brought into the attack in the 13th over and struck off her first delivery, cleaning up de Leede for 37 to break the stand.
Francis Chipare doubled it up with the wicket of Kalis two overs later, trapping her in front for 34 off 37 balls.
Netherlands added 42 runs in the last five overs with Robine Rijke leading the charge. She remained unbeaten on 39 off 25 balls to give the innings the late push it badly needed.
In reply, Modester Mupachikwa led Zimbabwe’s fight at the top but Netherlands struck at the other end, sending back three batters inside the Powerplay.
Frederique Overdijk, Silver Siegers and Zwilling took a wicket apiece as Zimbabwe were reduced to 29/3. Caroline de Lange added another scalp to the tally after the Powerplay, sending Ashley Ndiraya back to the hut for three.
Nkomo and Mupachikwa resurrected the innings with a solid partnership but with Netherlands maintaining impeccable discipline with the ball, the runs were not coming as quickly as they would have wanted.
Zimbabwe needed 52 in the last five overs to win, but could only manage 37 more and finished on 121/4, despite the Nkomo-Mupachikwa stand remaining unbeaten.
Netherland’s triumph today makes it two in three games in the tournament so far.
Sri Lanka vs Uganda
A career-best T20I knock from Vishmi Gunaratne and a brilliant bowling effort led Sri Lanka to a massive win in Group A of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup Qualifier.
The opening stand began with a bang for Sri Lanka as Chamari Athapaththu and Gunaratne completed their fifty-run partnership from 45 balls. It was brought to a screeching halt by Janet Mbabazi who removed Athapaththu for 24 off 21.
Harshitha Madavi was run out shortly afterwards, but Gunaratne found support from Hasini Perera, who came in at number four. Gunaratne completed her half-century from 51 deliveries, with Perera being the aggressor at the other end. The latter was eventually dismissed for 30 off 24 balls in the 18th over.
Gunaratne finished on an unbeaten 73 off 64 balls, her highest score in T20Is, leading Sri Lanka to a formidable 154/4 in 20 overs.
In the chase, Sri Lanka were all over Uganda in no time, reducing them to 22/2 inside the Powerplay.
Inoka Ranaweera stepped into the attack immediately after the Powerplay and struck twice in two deliveries, limiting Uganda to 22/4. Left-arm wrist spinner, Shashini Gimhani, also took a wicket in her first over, leaving Uganda five wickets down inside 10 overs with 35 runs on the board.
Prosscovia Alako resisted Sri Lanka’s charge but scarcely found support from the other end as wickets kept tumbling. She made 36 in 32 balls and was the seventh batter dismissed.
Kavisha Dilhari saw off the last two wickets from successive deliveries in the final over and Uganda were bundled out for 87, handing Sri Lanka a satisfactory victory.
With the 67-run win, Sri Lanka continue their unbeaten streak in the tournament with three wins out of three in Group A.
Scores in brief:
Match 13:
Netherlands beat Zimbabwe by 14 runs
Netherlands 135 for 6 in 20 overs (Robin Rijke 39 not out, Babette De Leede 37, Sterre Kalis 34; Francisca Chipare 2-27)
Zimbabwe 121 for 4 in 20 overs (Josephine Nkomo 39 not out, Modester Mupachikwa 39 not out; Caroline De Lange 1-17, Iris Zwilling 1-19)
Player of the Match – Babette De Leede
Match 14:
Sri Lanka beat Uganda by 67 runs
Sri Lanka 154 for 4 in 20 overs (Vishmi Gunaratne 73 not out, Hasini Perera 30; Janet Mbabazi 1-19)
Uganda 87 all out in 19.2 overs (Prosscovia Alako 36; Inoka Ranaweera 2-10, Shashini Gimhani 2-23, Kavisha Dilhari 2-27)
Player of the Match – Vishmi Gunaratne
(ICC)
Tilak Varma (c), Priyansh Arya, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Riyan Parag (vc), Ayush Badoni, Nishant Sindhu, Harsh Dubey, Suryansh Shedge, Prabhsimran Singh (wk), Kumar Kushagra (wk), Vipraj Nigam, Yash Thakur, Yudhvir Singh, Anshul Kamboj, Arshad Khan
Saudi Arabia is set to host its first franchise league later this year, with the ‘Dunes League T20’ due to launch in October. The league has been sanctioned by the Saudi Arabia Cricket Federation (SACF) and is expected to feature players who have recently retired from international cricket but remain active on the franchise circuit.
Saudi Arabia has been a major disruptor in the sporting world over the last five years as the oil-rich kingdom looks to diversify its economy, staging lucrative football, tennis and boxing events. The nation’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) also launched the breakaway LIV Golf tour, though has recently announced that it will withdraw funding at the end of this season.
There have been widespread rumours over the last three years that Saudi Arabia would disrupt cricket by launching a T20 league to rival the IPL, with further speculation last year about potential investment in a ‘Grand Slam-style’ circuit of T20 leagues floated by the Australian Cricketers’ Association.
In practice, Arabia’s entry into the cricketing world has been gradual, via sponsorship deals with the ICC and staging the IPL auction in 2024. The SACF also partnered with the UAE’s ILT20 last year, and has signed a long-term agreement to stage the FairBreak Women’s T20 Challenge, though the first edition has been postponed due to conflict in the Gulf region.
The six-team Dunes T20 League is planned to launch in October with matches played in Taif, near Jeddah. It has been developed in partnership with the Sports Asian Network and two talent agencies: Unique Sports Group, whose clients include Jofra Archer, and Prolithic, who manage Abhishek Sharma. Prolithic’s Yuvraj Singh will act as the league’s ambassador.
The SACF initially announced provisional plans for the league late last year and said that it was designed to put Saudi Arabia “on the global cricket map” and “develop Saudi talent”.
The league is expected to feature a maximum of four players who have played full-member international cricket in the last two years, thereby falling under the threshold that demands approval from the ICC. Top salaries could reach USD 100,000.
[Cricinfo]
After back-to-back ducks in his last two innings, Virat Kohli showed most emphatically that he had merely been out of runs and not out of form, scoring his ninth IPL hundred to lead Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) to the top of the IPL 2026 table with a commanding win over Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in Raipur.
Kohli’s unbeaten 60-ball 105 was a vintage effort in a run-chase – smooth, controlled, and full of both relentless sprinting between the wickets and gorgeous strokeplay, particularly at either end of his innings. That he never seemed stretched, however, was perhaps the story of the match – it may have been decided by the relative quality of the bowling attacks, particularly the seamers.
RCB’s bowlers did a superb job to keep KKR down to below 200 even though they only lost four wickets, and KKR’s inexperienced seam attack simply couldn’t match them for discipline and ability to extract misbehaviour from a slightly two-paced surface – with the caveat that it may have eased up a little during the second innings.
This was the first time RCB had fielded all three of Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jacob Duffy and Josh Hazlewood – the legspinner Suyash Sharma made way. This suggested RCB expected conditions to play similarly to their previous game in Raipur, against Mumbai Indians, with seam movement and inconsistent bounce throughout.
When the match began – after a rain delay of an hour and a quarter – it became clear that this was a much better pitch to bat on, but there was still something in it for the seamers. Bhuvneshwar showed this with a cross-seamer that nipped away to nick off Finn Allen in the third over, and Hazlewood showed this by getting a short-of-length ball to rear at Ajinkya Rahane and have him caught and bowled off a miscued pull in the fifth over.
KKR still scored 56 in their powerplay, though, and 31 of those runs came in two overs from Duffy, who took the new ball ahead of Hazlewood, and didn’t do too much that was obviously wrong, but Allen, Rahane and Angkrish Raghuvansh were good enough to put away marginal errors in line and length.
That Dubey over was the last bit of real joy with the ball for KKR. Vaibhav Arora kept drifting onto Kohli’s pads in an 18-run second over, and then Bethell took his revenge on Dubey by going 6, 4, 4 at the start of the third.
Kartik Tyagi removed Bethell with a nasty short ball that rushed him on the pull, but he followed that up by straying down the leg side and overcompensating with width, and Devdutt Padikkal put both away to the boundary to get his innings moving.
RCB finished the powerplay at 66 for 1, with Kohli swivelling to pull Tyagi for six in the sixth over and ending that phase on 30 off 14.
From there, it was just a case of ticking off the remaining runs with no need for undue risk. No one is better at that game than Kohli. He scored eight twos – the joint third-most for him in an IPL innings – and found the boundary whenever the viewer may have wondered how long it had been since the last one. Mishaps at the other end – Tyagi dismissed Padikkal with an into-the-pitch cutter before pinging Rajat Patidar on the helmet; a Sunil Narine carrom ball forced a miscue from Patidar; Manish Pandey took a flying one-hander at point to send back Tim David – were mere blips in RCB’s otherwise silky-smooth ride.
And as the end neared, Kohli grew more expansive, playing two of his most eye-catching shots – a straight six off Anukul Roy with barely any follow-through, and a whipped six of iron wrists off Tyagi – to hurry towards the century mark. He got there with a single off Arora in the 19th over, and Jitesh Sharma finished the game soon after, flat-batting Dubey past long-on to bring up victory with five balls remaining.
Brief scores:
Royal Challengers Bengaluru 194 for 4 in 19.1 overs (Jacob Bethell 15, Virat Kohli 105*, Devdutt Padikkal 39, Rajat Patidar 11; Kartik Tyagi 3-32, Sunil Narine 1-31) beat Kolkata Knight Riders 192 for 4 in 20 overs (Ajinkya Rahane 19, Finn Allen 18, Angkrish Raghuvanshi 71, Rinku Singh 49*, Cameron Green 32; Bhuveneshwar Kumar 1-34, Josh Hazelwood 1-35, Raasik Salam 1-35) by six wickets
[Cricinfo]
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