Chamari Athapaththu: “It’s a little tough day in the middle. As a bowling unit, we had to get some wickets earlier. 140 was a good score to chase, but they scored 160+ so it was not easy to chase. As a batting unit, we had to play positive shots but we lost wickets early. [Asked if the pressure got to the team] The game plan did not come together. Some players felt some pressure in the middle.
As a captain, they need some experience. I have only a few senior players in the team. A lot of girls are very young girls and they have not played a lot of cricket and don’t have the experience for this kind of game. If we take too much pressure on our shoulders, the result comes like this. We played good cricket this tournament beating South Africa and Bangladesh and played good cricket against Australia. Today is a very tough day but we learned a lot of things and hopefully will carry that into the future.”
Sophie Devine: “I wish this was our first game of the tournament but it’s not to me. After that second match, I said I felt embarrassed. I just feel extreme pride right now in the group to bounce back in the way that we have. We’ve given ourselves a chance. Even if it’s a tiny, small chance, we’re still in with a shout so I’m really proud of this group. [On Suzie Bates] Especially the way that we played the last game, it can be easy to think it’s just going to roll into the next game, but for her to build such a great partnership with Bernie was outstanding.
We spoke about 160 and knew this wicket was tougher than the Newlands wicket so the bowlers did outstanding. The first game of the tournament with Sri Lanka upsetting South Africa laid the platform for shocks and upsets. Australia are still winning so that’s pretty boring but in the women’s game, competitiveness is what we want. It’s so awesome to see the likes of Ireland coming along and really starting to trouble teams, Pakistan and Bangladesh, that’s exactly what we want as female cricketers, for anyone to be able to beat anyone on any given day. The support that this whole tournament has had has been outstanding. The singing and dancing really add to it so we love the support.”
Amelia Kerr is named Player of the Match: “It was just nice to have a performance and get a big win there for the team. It was a tough start to the tournament so to get the win is awesome. I think I’ve been light on runs so it was nice to spend some time in the middle and bat with Suzie, who is a class act. With the ball at the moment, it feels like it’s coming out really well. I’m loving bowling even more than I have before. We thought it was a pretty tough wicket and the ball was keeping low so we just focused on playing straight and looking for twos first and then boundaries.”
NZ WMN vs SL WMN Highlights today, Sunday 19-2-2023. 17th Match, Group 1 (N), Boland Park, Paarl, ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2023.
Toss: NZ WMN chose to bat.
New Zealand Women team: 1 Suzie Bates, 2 Bernadine Bezuidenhout (wk), 3 Georgia Plimmer, 4 Amelia Kerr, 5 Sophie Devine (capt.), 6 Maddy Green, 7 Hannah Rowe, 8 Lea Tahuhu, 9 Jess Kerr, 10 Eden Carson, 11 Fran Jonas.
Sri Lanka Women team: 1 Harshitha Samarawickrama, 2 Chamari Athapaththu (capt.), 3 Vishmi Gunaratne, 4 Oshadi Ranasinghe, 5 Anushka Sanjeewani (wk), 6 Nilakshi de Silva, 7 Kavisha Dilhari, 8 Malsha Shehani, 9 Sugandika Kumari, 10 Inoka Ranaweera, 11 Achini Kulasuriya.
Head to Head In T20I’s: 9
New Zealand Women Won: 9
Sri Lanka Women Won: 0
New Zealand Women T20I Rankings: 3rd
Sri Lanka Women T20I Rankings: 8th
Form guide
(last five completed T20I’s, most recent first)
New Zealand Women WLLWW
Sri Lanka Women LWWLW
Match Timings: 5:00 PM GMT | 7:00 PM Local
Umpires – N Janani, Sue Redfern
TV Umpire – Lauren Agenbag
Match Referee – GS Lakshmi
Reserve Umpire – Vrinda Rathi
Match number – WT20I no. 1372
