Indian eves target semis

Mithali's women take on SA

A confident India will seek to extend their unbeaten run to five matches and secure a semifinal spot when they take on South Africa in the ICC Women’s World Cup here on Saturday.

India are on a rampaging run having beaten England, West Indies, Pakistan and Sri Lanka convincingly to be second in the standings behind Australia.

South Africa, on the other hand, are fifth with two wins and a loss from four games with one ending in a washout.

Not only because of the good cricket they have been playing in the tournament, India will also take heart from their recent success against South Africa, whom they beat in the final of a quadrangular series in May.

“We are quite confident for the game against South Africa because in the last four or five games we have played against them we have done well,” said Veda Krishnamurthy on eve of the game. “We are aware of their team, we know what combinations and players are there, so we can play according to our strengths. We played them a couple of months back so we know their strengths and weaknesses.”

India were able to defend 232 in their previous game Sri Lanka although they looked like posting a bigger total after the launchpad provided by Deepti Sharma (78) and skipper Mithali Raj (53).

With 206 runs at 68.66, stylish opener Smriti Mandhana remains India’s leading run getter despite failures in the last two games. Mithali has led from the front, scoring 178 runs in four games, which includes two half centuries.

The spin trio of Ekta Bisht, Poonam Yadav and Deepti Sharma have been the backbone of India’s bowling, sharing 19 wickets amongst them.