India cruise to victory in fourth T20 and seal historic series win over England
England sit above India in the ICC's official T20 team rankings but the manner of this defeat suggests the rankings have not quite caught up with reality.
England were outplayed in every department. With the bat, they suffered from a combination of poor shot selection and general muddle-headedness to finish on 126 for seven. India's fielding was so blisteringly good that England failed to score a single boundary between the 11th and 19th overs.
India's openers Shafali Verma and Smriti Mandhana then raced to 53 without loss in the powerplay, displaying the controlled aggression which England had so lacked, and laying a secure enough platform that a few overs of sensible batting and strike rotation from Harmanpreet Kaur and Jemimah Rodrigues enabled the latter to hit the winning runs with three overs to spare.
Sophie Ecclestone, playing in her 100th international, took one for 20 in her four overs and held onto a catch at mid-off to see off Kaur, the Indian captain. She had earlier broken England's boundary drought at the death, slogging a six over midwicket to finish unbeaten on 16 from 10.
But it was too little, too late in an innings punctuated by regular wickets. Danni Wyatt-Hodge, Tammy Beaumont and Paige Scholfield were all caught by Arundhati Reddy trying to heave down the ground, while Alice Capsey missed her attempted reverse to Shree Charani, was given out leg-before, and was so unconvinced by her own decision to review that she walked off before third umpire Jacqueline Williams had given her verdict.
A panicked Charlie Dean then set off for a single after hitting the ball straight out to Charani at short third, was sent back and was so far out of her ground that even a flailing Richa Ghosh couldn't fail to run her out.
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Earlier, Deepti Sharma had become only the second Indian woman to reach 300 wickets after Sophia Dunkley got a thick edge out to backward point in the sixth over and fell for 22 – the top score of the England innings, and the start of its unravelling.
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