New Zealand women picked up a comprehensive win over Sri Lanka women to boost their chances of a semifinal berth. It was a pretty one-sided affair where New Zealand women restricted Sri Lanka women to 115-5 before chasing the target with eight wickets to spare.
New Zealand's win over Sri Lanka is not great news for India. The Harmanpreet Kaur-led side, one of the favourites to win the title, suffered a shock defeat to New Zealand in the first game but bounced back to beat Pakistan and Sri Lanka to revive their campaign. However, the defeat against New Zealand caused a massive dent to India's run rate, which could be the decisive factor in determining the semifinalists.
India needed the White Ferns to lose the remaining games which would have given India an easy passage to the semifinal. However, New Zealand's win over Sri Lanka has now put India's campaign in jeopardy. India now will have to beat Australia in their last game and hope that Pakistan beat New Zealand to move into the semifinal. Australia are undefeated so far in the tournament and getting through them will take a mammoth effort from the Women in Blue.
If India lose to Australia and New Zealand beat Pakistan, which is a great possibility given the recent form of teams, India will be knocked out. If India lose to Australia and New Zealand lose to Pakistan, still, the teams will be tied on points and the team with a better run rate will go through. Pakistan's net run rate is too bad so they are mostly out of the equation and It will be a close battle between India and New Zealand. Both teams are very close in terms of run rate thus a big defeat for India against Australia could also knock the Women in Blue out of the tournament.