Indian team heads to the UAE for the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup

NEW DELHI: The Indian women's cricket team has left for the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to compete in the ICC Women's T20 World Cup, which starts on October 3.
This year, the performance of India's women's cricket team has fluctuated. They suffered series losses against Australia and England, but managed a series victory over Bangladesh. In July, they tied their T20 International series with South Africa.India reached the final of the Asia Cup 2024 but lost to Sri Lanka, who remained unbeaten during the tournament.
In the previous T20 World Cup held in 2022, India got to the semi-finals but were defeated by Australia by five runs. Australia went on to win the tournament, claiming their sixth title by beating South Africa by 19 runs. In 2020, India reached their first T20 World Cup final at the Melbourne Cricket Ground but scored only 99 runs while chasing Australia's target of 185.

India will participate in warm-up matches against the West Indies and South Africa before the 2024 T20 World Cup.
The BCCI Women's Cricket official X handle shared photos of key players, including captain Harmanpreet Kaur, Smriti Mandhana, Shafali Varma, Jemimah Rodrigues, Renuka Thakur, and Pooja Vastrakar.
Before the team's departure at a press conference in Mumbai, captain Harmanpreet Kaur expressed her confidence about facing Australia in Abu Dhabi.
This time, Harmanpreet is confident about India's chances, stating, "Look, their team is good, no doubt about that. They also know that India is one of the teams that can challenge them. I think that is a really positive sign. We know that whenever we play against them, we can beat them any day, any time. Winning the title after so many years is a great opportunity for us. They know we are a strong team. We just want to play good cricket and stay focused on what will help us beat them."

She added, "If I talk about this team, we have a few players who have been playing for a long time and know their roles really well. I'm quite confident with this team, and I can say that, yes, it's the best team going into the World Cup."
India's T20 World Cup campaign is set to commence on October 4 against New Zealand at the Dubai International Stadium.
Squad: Harmanpreet Kaur (c), Smriti Mandhana (vc), Shafali Verma, Deepti Sharma, Jemimah Rodrigues, Richa Ghosh (wk), Yastika Bhatia (wk), Pooja Vastrakar, Arundhati Reddy, Renuka Singh, Dayalan Hemalatha, Asha Sobhana, Radha Yadav, Shreyanka Patil, Sajana Sajeevan
Travelling reserves: Uma Chetry (wk), Tanuja Kanwer, Saima Thakor
Non-Travelling Reserves: Raghvi Bist, Priya Mishra