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Radha Yadav, batters lead India to 5-0 T20I series sweep over Bangladesh
India extended their dominance over Bangladesh to complete a 5-0 T20I series sweep with a 21-run win in the fifth and final game in Sylhet on Thursday. India posted 156 for 5 after opting to bat, thanks to strong hands from Dayalan Hemalatha, Harmanpreet Kaur, Smriti Mandhana and a late cameo from Richa Ghosh. Though Ritu Moni and Shorifa Khatun fought back in the second half of the chase after Radha Yadav’s three-wicket burst, it wasn’t enough for a consolation win for Bangladesh.
Radha, on her comeback for India after being off the national radar for a year, ended the series as the most successful bowler with ten wickets, which got her the Player-of-the-Series award to go with the Player-of-the-Match award for her three-wicket haul on Thursday.
Coming off a 2-1 T20I series defeat at home against Australia, India will be happy to have produced a convincing series victory in Bangladesh, where the T20 World Cup will be held in October. Bangladesh, though, have lost eight T20Is in a row now, five here and three earlier against Australia, all at home.
But, despite losing five wickets by the halfway stage in the chase, Bangladesh went past the 120-run mark for the first time in the series, thanks to Moni’s 33-ball 37 and Shorifa’s unbeaten 28 from 21 balls. However, there was little of note from the other batters.
Titas Sadhu gave India their first breakthrough when she removed Sobhana Mostary for a nine-ball 13 in the third over. In the next over, Radha struck, dismissing Dilara Akter as she miscued a pull to mid-off. Radha’s third double-wicket over of the series came in the ninth of the innings when she knocked out Nigar Sultana’s stump with a loopy delivery that spun in, and three balls later, she trapped Rubya Haider lbw for 20. After that over, she had figures of 2-0-4-3. She finished with 3 for 24 after being targeted by Moni and Shorifa.
After ten overs, Bangladesh were 52 for 5, needing 105 from the remaining 60 balls.
But Moni fought back. She charged down the track against the spinners, used width when it was on offer to score towards backward point, and played a ramp shot to Pooja Vastrakar as well. With Shorifa , she shared a 57-run partnership off 41 balls for the sixth wicket, bringing the equation down to 53 runs from 24 balls. However, S Asha, playing her second T20I, dismissed Moni in the 17th over to end Bangladesh’s hopes. Asha finished with 2 for 25 from her four overs.
With Bangladesh sloppy in the field, India raced to 71 for 2 after ten overs, Mandhana and Hemalatha taking control after Shafali Verma, playing her 100th international game, fell early. Mandhana, in particular, showed good intent in her 25-ball 33, hitting four clean fours and an inside-out six over extra cover off offspinner Sultana Khatun. However, she was given out lbw in the eighth over, with replays suggesting that the ball hit her pad just outside off stump as she missed with an attempted back-foot punch. No DRS meant Mandhana had to go.
Hemalatha, at No. 3, started slowly, scoring 13 off her first 17 balls. She was also dropped when on 8. However, she accelerated, finding her touch soon to score 37 off 28 balls. This included two powerful hits to long-on and long-off for sixes and two fours – a sweep and a swpie over midwicket after charging down the track.
India’s innings really took off when she was joined by Harmanpreet. The two scored 60 off 42 deliveries for the third wicket with the India captain chipping in with a 24-ball 30. After a run-a-ball 12, Harmanpreet picked up her pace, hitting three fours off Moni in the 13th over. However, Harmanpreet’s wicket – trapped lbw by left-arm spinner Nahida Akter when she went across for a sweep shot – triggered a mini collapse as India went from 122 for 2 to 124 for 5 in six balls.
After a few quiet overs, Ghosh injected some impetus into the innings, teeing off to hit an unbeaten 28 off 17 balls, hitting three fours and a six over the bowlers’ head to help India ger past 150, which was well beyond Bangladesh’s reach.
Brief scores:
India Women 156 for 5 in 20 overs (Dayalan Hemalatha 37, Smriti Mandhana 33, Harmanpreet Kaur 30, Richa Ghosh 28*; Sultana Khatun 1-26, Rabeya Khan 2-28, Nahida Akter 2-27) beat Bangladesh Women 135 for 6 in 20 overs (Rubya Haider 20, Ritu Moni 37, Shorifa Khatun 28*; Titas Sadhu 1-27, Radha Yadav 3-24, Asha Sobhana 2-25) by 21 runs
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said that Canada’s old relationship with the United States, “based on deepening integration of our economies and tight security and military cooperation, is over”.
Speaking to reporters in Ottawa after a cabinet meeting, Carney said Canadians must “fundamentally re-imagine our economy” in the face of US President Donald Trump’s tariffs.
He said Canada would respond with retaliatory tariffs that will have “maximum impact” on the US.
Trump announced on Wednesday he would target imported vehicles and vehicle parts with a 25% tax, stating: “This is permanent.”
Carney, the Liberal Party leader, called the original Canada-US Automotive Products Agreement signed in 1965 the most important deal in his lifetime. “That’s finished with these tariffs,” he said in French.
He continued that Canada can sustain an auto industry with the US tariffs provided the government and business community work to “re-imagine” and “retool” the industry.
Canada needs to build an economy Canadians can control, he said, and that would include rethinking it’s trade relationship with other partners. It remains to be seen whether Canadians can have a strong trading relationship with the United States going forward, he added.
Carney has switched his campaign plans ahead of next month’s general election to confront the latest import duties.
The US has already partially imposed a blanket 25% tariff on Canadian goods, along with a 25% duty on all Aluminum and steel imports. Canada has so far retaliated with about C$60bn ($42bn; £32bn) of tariffs on US goods.
The new car tariffs will come into effect on 2 April, with charges on businesses importing vehicles starting the next day, the White House said. Taxes on parts are set to start in May or later.
Early on Thursday morning, Trump warned Canada and the EU against joining forces versus the US in the trade war.
“If the European Union works with Canada in order to do economic harm to the USA, large scale Tariffs, far larger than currently planned, will be placed on them both,” he posted on his Truth Social platform.
Carney met his ministers in Ottawa on Thursday morning to “discuss trade options”. He had originally been scheduled to campaign in Quebec.
He said during his press conference that President Trump had reached out to him last night to schedule a call, and that it would take place in the “next day or two”.
If it takes place, this would be the first call between the pair.
Pierre Poilievre, leader of the Conservatives, the main opposition party, called the tariffs “unjustified and unprovoked”.
The NDP, a left-wing party that previously helped prop up the minority Liberal government of ex-PM Justin Trudeau, also switched its campaign plans on Thursday.
Jagmeet Singh, the NDP leader, spent the day meeting union leaders and car workers in Windsor, Ontario, an auto manufacturing hub across from Detroit, Michigan.
He said the US tariffs are a “betrayal” against a close ally, saying that “Donald Trump has started an illegal trade war with Canada” for “absolutely no reason”.
He said any auto company that moves their operations out of Canada because of the tariffs should be blocked from selling cars in the country.
Canadians go to the polls on 28 April.
The US imported about eight million cars last year – accounting for about $240bn in trade and roughly half of overall sales.
Before the match, many expected Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) to post the first 300-plus total in the IPL. There were reasons to speculate that. SRH had posted 286 for 6 in their previous game, also in Hyderabad, and Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) were without at least two of their first-choice bowlers.
Forget 300, SRH could not even score 200. They managed only 190 for 9 with Shardul Thakur picking up 4 for 34, his best figures in the IPL.
Still, 190 was not a small total, but Nicholas Pooran made it look minuscule. He smashed 70 off just 26 balls, hitting six fours and as many sixes on the way. By the time Pat Cummins had him lbw, LSG needed only 71 from 68 balls.
Mitchell Marsh, who was playing second fiddle to Pooran, also scored a fifty before Abdul Samad applied the finishing touches.
LSG chasing down their target with 23 balls and five wickets to spare was giving SRH a taste of their own medicine. Last season, Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma had taken just 9.4 overs to chase down LSG’s 165 at this very venue.
LSG knew the only way to stop the marauding SRH batting unit was to take early wickets. Shardul went in search of swing in the first over but did not find success. But in his next over, he dismissed Abhishek and Ishan Kishan off successive balls. Abhishek pulled a short ball into the hands of deep square leg, and Kishan was caught down the leg side.
Head went after the returning Avesh Khan, hitting him for two sixes and a four in the fourth over. Two overs later, he tried to take on Ravi Bishnoi but ended up skying a slog sweep. Pooran, though, put the chance down at long-on. Four balls later, Bishnoi failed to latch on to a tough return catch.
Head was on 35 at the time of the first drop but it cost LSG only 12 as Prince Yadav made a mess of Head’s stumps for his first wicket in the IPL.
Nitish Kumar Reddy and Heinrich Klaasen took SRH past 100 in the 11th over before Klaasen was run out in a bizarre fashion. Nitish hit a full toss from Prince to the bowler’s left. Prince failed to hold on to the catch but the ball found a way to ricochet onto the stumps at the non-striker’s end with Klaasen well outside his crease. Soon after, Bishnoi castled Nitish for 32 off 28, leaving SRH in a spot of bother.
In keeping with the team ethos, the SRH batters kept attacking. But while they kept hitting sixes, they also kept getting out. Aniket Verma smashed Bishnoi for two back-to-back sixes and repeated it against Digvesh Rathi in the following over before getting out for 36 off 13 balls. Cummins walked in at No. 8, hit the first three balls he faced for three sixes, and was out on the fourth. That took SRH to 180 for 8 after 18 overs. However, only ten runs came from the last two.
Mohammed Shami removed Aiden Markram in the second over of the chase but Pooran took the attack to the opposition. His first boundary came via a misfield before he smoked Simarjeet Singh over deep midwicket twice in two balls.
Bringing on a left-arm orthodox spinner with Pooran in the middle is always risky. But Cummins took that gamble with Abhishek. Pooran faced only two balls from him and slog-swept both for sixes. He has now hit seven sixes off nine balls against Abhishek in T20 cricket.
He didn’t spare Adam Zampa either, hitting him for two sixes and a four in the seventh over. Off the first 20 balls he faced, he hit five fours and six sixes.
Marsh was on 37 off 22 balls when Pooran got out. He had hit Shami for two straight sixes in the powerplay. In the 11th over, he hit Cummins for back-to-back fours to bring up his fifty off 29 balls. Cummins had him caught at long-on soon after but it was too late.
At the end of 11 overs, LSG needed only 53. They did lose Rishabh Pant and Ayush Badoni along the way but their victory was never in doubt. Samad, a former SRH player, smashed an unbeaten 22 off eight balls to complete the formalities.
Brief scores:
Lucknow Super Giants 193 for 5 in 16.1 overs (Nicholas Pooran 70, Mitchell Marsh 52, Rishabh Punt 15, David Miler 13*, Abdul Samad 22*; Mohammed Shami 1-37, Pat Cummins 2-29, Adam Zampa 1-46, Harshal Patel 1-48) beat Sunrisers Hyderabad 190 for 9 in 20 overs (Travis Head 47, Aniket Verma 36, Nitish Kumar Reddy 32, Heinrich Klassen 26, Pat Cummins 18, Harshal Patel 12*; Shardul Thakur 4-34, Avesh Khan 1-45, Digvesh Rathi 1-40, Ravi Bishnoi 1-42, Prince Yadav 1-29) by five wickets
[Cricinfo]
Six tourists were killed and 39 rescued when a submarine sank in the Egyptian Red Sea, the local governor confirms.
The accident happened around one kilometre off the coast of Hurghada The governor says the tourists were from Russia, Norway, Sweden, and India – all six who died were Russian.
A Telegram post from the Association of Tour Operators of Russia, says that according to unconfirmed reports the submarine hit a reef and lost pressure and that the collision happened at a depth of 20 metres (65 feet), the post adds. The company website says it takes tourists to a maximum depth of 25 metres.
The post adds that all excursions and ticket sales for the tours have been suspended, and all other recreational submersible dives off the Hurghada coast have been cancelled.
[BBC]
Canada PM Mark Carney says old relationship with US ‘is over’
Showers or thundershowers will occur at several places in Western, Sabaragamuwa, Southern, and Uva provinces and in Nuwara-Eliya district after 2.00 p.m
Gender inequality is not a women’s issue, it is a societal issue that demands attitudinal and behavioural transformation. – Prime Minister
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