Deepti Sharma and Shafali Verma's superb all-round showing powered India to a historic first-ever Women's ODI World Cup title after they outclassed South Africa by 52 runs in the final.
Eight-team Women's Emerging Nations Trophy launched by ICC
South African captain Temba Bavuma on Sunday said his game is built around an unshakeable defence, which stood him in good stead on a disintegrating Eden Gardens track, where 38 wickets fell inside eight sessions.
All-round performances from Shafali Verma and Deepti Sharma were the crowning jewels for the team in the title clash.
In its report released on Monday, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and UN Women said that femicide continues to take the lives of tens of thousands of women and girls worldwide, with no sign of real progress.
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'Kuldeep's wedding is planned for the last week of November. The team management will assess when they will need his services before granting the exact number of leaves.'
India have been served well by Shreyas Iyer in ODIs at No. 4 but with the Mumbai batter unavailable due to injury, the team management entrusted Gaikwad with the job to build the innings and he did it with aplomb, hitting his maiden century in the second ODI against South Africa on Wednesday.
Armed with a potent spin attack, taking on South Africa seems like competing against a "subcontinent team", Ten Doeschate said, admitting that they need to get better at negotiating the challenge posed by tweakers.
India won their maiden Women's World Cup title with a 52-run victory over South Africa at the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai on Sunday.
India vice-captain Rishabh Pant is understandably delighted to have made a difficult comeback from the latest injury setback.
Bavuma believes this group, unbeaten in full-strength Test series since coach Shukri Conrad took charge in 2023, has the maturity and belief to mount a serious challenge and win their only second series in India after 25 years.
Mandhana led the Indian charge at the top, and her partnerships with opening batter Pratika Rawal created quite a buzz in the showpiece event.
In a first for the tournament, the WPL final will not be played over the weekend, but on Thursday, February, probably to avoid a clash with the men's T20 World Cup, which begins the same week in India and Sri Lanka.
A Test match in India usually starts at 9:30 am and the day's play ends at 4:30 pm, while the game in Guwahati will begin at 9 am and end at 4 pm.
With the scars of last year's home series whitewash against New Zealand still raw, preparing rank turners may invite risk.
Abhimanyu Easwaran made the future path all the more tough with his second duck of the match, while Sai Sudharsan concluded his lukewarm preparation for the South Africa Test series with an underwhelming 23 off 38 balls.
Ahead of India's opening Test against South Africa, head coach Gautam Gambhir made a spiritual stop at Kolkata's iconic Kalighat Mandir, seeking blessings before the start of the two-match series.
The collapse, India's lowest failed chase at home, has left behind deeper fault lines than a dry Eden Gardens wicket can conceal.
Smriti Mandhana dropped a rung to second but Jemimah Rodrigues scaled nine positions to be 10th in the latest ICC women's ODI rankings after India's title-winning World Cup performance.
'The Women in Blue's final act drew a peak concurrency of 21 million viewers as Harmanpreet Kaur's team became the first Asian team to lift the Women's World Cup.'
India offset the decline in exports to traditional destinations by sharply ramping up shipments to Jordan (18,086 per cent), Hong Kong (17,006 per cent), Spain (13,436 per cent), the Philippines (2,235 per cent), and Namibia (1,068 per cent) in H1FY26.
Former India batter Cheteshwar Pujara on Thursday stressed that each and every bilateral assignment will be "very important" now for stalwarts Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma as India look ahead to the 2027 ODI World Cup.
Defending champions India will open their campaign against USA in Mumbai on February 7 before facing Namibia in Delhi on February 12.
Marco Jansen's dream Test continues; flurry of records shattered in Guwahati
Smriti Mandhana's haldi ceremony transformed into a lively gathering filled with colour, laughter and camaraderie, as her Team India mates joined her to mark the special occasion.
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The match between Australia and England was abandoned due to rain.
The Indian team management has kept the media guessing but Rishabh Pant is set to become India's 38th Test captain.
South African captain Laura Wolvaardt said she "couldn't be prouder" of her team's campaign in the ICC Women's World Cup and promised to get stronger in the coming times after they lost to India in the title clash in Navi Mumbai on Sunday.
'You saw Yashasvi Jaiswal start in the second innings, did you see the first three balls, the kind of shots that he attempted?'
'A total of 19 players have registered in the highest base-price bracket of Rs.50 lakh, 11 players in the Rs. 40 lakh bracket, and 88 players in the Rs.30 lakh bracket.'
The Proteas had kept the decision on playing Rabada open until Friday morning.
The entire nation erupted in joy when captain Harmanpreet Kaur completed the decisive catch to dismiss Nadine de Klerk off Deepti's bowling in the 46th over.
Senuran Muthusamy and Marco Jansen made Indian finger spinners' look ordinary in good batting conditions with invaluable lower-order contributions as South Africa seized control of the second Test.
The recipe for Indian higher education institutions to succeed in the global markets is excellence in academics, promoting contemporary socially relevant material, and enabling individuals (learners) to realise their full potential, suggests N Ravichandran.
Sai Sudharsan and Dhruv Jurel faced spinners while wearing only one pad to counter the turning deliveries, a method that comes with an element of risk, in Kolkata on Monday.
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