In the 2024-25 Senior Women’s One Day Challenger Trophy Final, Team C, tied on wins with Teams D and E, two from four games, but with a better Net Run Rate advanced to meet Team A, who registered 3 wins from 4 games. The Final, played at M A Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai, turned out to be a thrilling contest.
The leading run-scorer of the tournament, Shafali Verma, again got off aggressively but failed to convert her start, departing for 26(21), laying a decent 37-run opening-wicket stand in 6.4 overs alongside Dhara Gujjar. While Sonia Mendhiya departed cheaply for 4 off 15, opener Gujjar, alongside Pragya Rawat, led some sort of a recovery, accumulating 26 runs before Rawat departed for 9(30).
In-form Tanusree Sarkar (14) joined a set Gujjar (34), but Team C continued to chip away, dismissing the pair in quick succession to reduce Team A to 5/97 in 23.5 overs. Mukta Magre joined Shipra Giri in the middle, and the duo shared a crucial partnership, worth 38 runs, before the latter departed for 23(39). Arundhati Reddy was next in, and while she hung in for only 23 runs, she importantly shared a much-needed partnership with Magre, worth 67 runs.
The set batter Magre was joined by Simran Dil Bahadur (16), and their 35-run stand pushed Team A’s total past 230 runs, ultimately finishing on 239/10, with Magre unbeaten on 75 off 75 balls, stabilizing the innings and helping the team recover from 5/97. Prema Rawat (4/54) and Kaushalya Choudhary (4/38) shared 8 wickets between them, while Sneh Rana (1/51) also bagged a wicket.
Team C, in reply, didn’t have a good start, with Tripti Singh and Yastika Bhatia departing cheaply on scores of 8(15) and 5(14) respectively, being 2 down for 29 in 7.5 overs. Opener Vrinda Dinesh was joined by Riya Chaudhari and led a strong recovery, stabilizing the innings with a match-defining 93-run stand. A wicket brought another for Team A as Chaudhari (34) was followed by Vrinda (71), losing 4 for 130.
Henrietta Pereira and Chitra Singh Jamwal stepped up with a crucial recovery partnership, a 71-ball 57. Their partnership came to an end with Jamwal departing for 25(34), and Team C again lost wickets in pairs, with the set Pereira walking back shortly after for 40(54). Skipper Sneh Rana took strike, and stitching brief partnerships with Chaudhary and Kashvee Gautam kept her side in the contest.
Rana remained unbeaten on 25(32), alongside Rawat (8*), guiding the team over the line off the penultimate ball with 2 wickets in hand. Sonia led Team A’s fightback with the ball, producing bowling figures of 4/42 (10), while Arundhati Reddy also claimed a wicket.
Dinesh Vrinda was named the Player of the Match for a crucial 71, which set up an upset for Team A. However, while skipper Shafali Verma was on the losing side, she was named the Player of the Tournament for her 414 runs from 5 innings, at an average of 82.80 and a strike rate of 145.26. Notably, this came on the back of her snub from the national squad and 527 runs, at an average of 75.29 and a strike rate of 152.31, from 7 outings in the recently concluded Senior Women’s One Day Trophy.
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