Mandhana stars again in Indian women's series-clinching win against New Zealand
Mount Maunganui, Jan 29: Opener Smriti Mandhana led the chase for India with familiar panache after a feisty bowling performance that steered the side to a series-clinching eight-wicket triumph over New Zealand Women in the second one-dayer here Tuesday.
Opting to field, India produced an excellent effort to bowl out New Zealand for a paltry 161 in 44.2 overs before player of the match Mandhana (90 not out) and skipper Mithali Raj (63 not out) stitched a 151-run unbroken third-wicket stand to guide the team to an easy win.
The duo resurrected the Indian run chase from 15 for 2 after the early loss of opener Jemimah Rodrigues (0) and Deepti Sharma (8).
"It feels great but I think our bowlers deserved the player of the match award more than me. I will give it away to our bowlers, they did a great job to restrict New Zealand on a good wicket," Mandhana said in the post-match presentation.
The 22-year-old Mandhana has been in excellent form in recent times and Tuesday's half century was her eighth in the last 10 ODI innings. She hit 105 in the first match of the ongoing series.
On Tuesday, she took just 82 deliveries in her unbeaten knock of 90.
Raj, on the other hand, faced 111 deliveries in her sedate knock 63. But, she was a perfect counterfoil to the aggressive Mandhana.
Raj completed the run chase in style with a six as India reached to 166 for 2 in 35.2 overs.
"I am happy with the way the team is shaping up. I have always enjoyed batting in challenging conditions. It wasn't easy, it required patience here. Smriti is in good form and somebody had to give her support," Raj said.
India have now taken an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-match contest, which is part of the ICC Women's Championship series. The visiting side beat New Zealand in the first one-dayer by nine wickets at the same venue on January 24. The third and final match of the series is scheduled to be held in Hamilton on February 1.
It was a fitting revenge for the Indian team, which had lost the home leg of the ICC Women's Championship series 1-2 to New Zealand during the last cycle that ran from 2014-2016.
New Zealand are ranked second in the ICC Women's Championship table and are guaranteed a direct entry into the 50-over World Cup being the hosts.
Just like the first match, India opted to field and shot New Zealand out for a paltry 161 with senior pacer Jhulan Goswami grabbing 3 wickets for 23 to lead the Indian bowling charge.
The spin trio of Ekta Bisht, Poonam Yadav and Deepti Sharma, who had tormented New Zealand in India's nine-wicket win in the first ODI, took two wickets each to stifle the Kiwi innings yet again.
New Zealand captain Amy Satterthwaite top-scored with a 71 off 87 balls before she became Yadav's first victim in the 34th over. But she got little support from her other team-mates.
"Frustrated to be honest, not putting enough runs on the board. Just comes down to that really," she said after the match.
New Zealand made a disastrous start with opener Suzie Bates being dismissed for a nought off the fourth ball.
The home side were 62 for 5 in the 21st over and despite a spirited effort from Satterthwaite, they were all out for 161 in 44.2 overs, failing to bat through their full quota of overs for the second time in a row.
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Huge turnout amidst SIR shadow caps ballistic battle for Bengal
Kolkata (PTI): The West Bengal assembly polls ended on Wednesday with what the election watchdog said was the state's highest-ever voter turnout of 92.84 per cent, leading to mouth-watering anticipation ahead of the announcement of results on Monday as both contenders sounded sanguine about their victory prospects.
Wednesday's second phase saw a 92.48 per cent turnout. The concluding phase covering 142 constituencies in south Bengal appears poised to match the first phase's record voter participation of 93.19 per cent by the time final numbers are collated.
The figures put the combined poll percentage over the two-phases at 92.84 per cent. The first phase of polling was held on April 23.
"This is the highest-ever recorded poll participation since Independence in West Bengal," it said.
The capital Kolkata recorded a turnout of 88.59 per cent, with Purba Bardhaman district topping the charts at 93.78 per cent.
The scale of participation sent out an overarching political message — practically every single eligible voter in the state felt personally invested in the electoral process and its outcome. They turned out in numbers large enough to make every narrative contested and every claim of momentum politically loaded. If the first phase tested whether the BJP could retain its north Bengal citadel, the second and final round was always the real battle for the saffron party on whether it could breach the ruling TMC’s southern fortress of Kolkata, Howrah, Hooghly, Nadia, North and South 24 Parganas and Purba Bardhaman.
At the centre of the larger political fight stood Bhabanipur, no longer merely a south Kolkata constituency but Banerjee’s political refuge, her emotional home turf and the BJP’s chosen psychological battlefield.
Banerjee, 71, seeking a fourth consecutive term after 15 years in power, faced Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari in a prestige battle widely seen as a symbolic rematch of Nandigram, where Adhikari had defeated her in 2021 after crossing over from the TMC to the BJP.
Five years later, the duel shifted to Banerjee’s own bastion. For the TMC, retaining Bhabanipur is about protecting the chief minister’s authority in her own backyard. For the BJP, breaching it would puncture the aura of invincibility around Bengal’s most powerful political figure.
The constituency witnessed nearly 87 per cent polling, sharply up from around 61 per cent in the 2021 assembly polls and 57 per cent in the bypoll that brought Banerjee back to the House.
Banerjee – who usually votes later in the day and prefers staying indoors on the day of polls – broke convention and hit the ground before 8 am, moving through Chetla, Padmapukur and Chakraberia areas following complaints of alleged intimidation of local TMC leaders.
As she sat outside a booth amid heavy deployment of central forces, Adhikari arrived there and declared, "I will not allow any hooliganism." He opposed Banerjee moving around with "50-60 people" with her.
Banerjee accused the BJP of trying to "rig" the election by using central forces, election observers and officials.
"The BJP wants to rig this election. Polls in Bengal are usually peaceful. Is there a goonda raj here?" she said, alleging intimidation of TMC polling agents and late-night visits by CRPF personnel to party workers’ homes.
"The atrocities by the central forces are unprecedented. What is happening is not at all free and fair polls. But despite all this, we have full faith that we will win," she said after casting her vote.
Adhikari dismissed the charges as "frustration", claiming Banerjee had realised that "not a single vote was coming her way".
Tension flared again in Kalighat when Adhikari visited another booth, and TMC workers raised slogans against him. Police resorted to a lathi-charge to disperse the crowd as BJP supporters answered with counter-slogans. Reports of sporadic tension were also received from some other areas amid sights of long queues at polling stations, booth-level flare-ups, and political bickering.
In Kolkata's Entally, BJP candidate Priyanka Tibrewal alleged that the TMC's polling agents tried to assault her after she objected to overcrowding inside a booth and a lack of voter privacy.
In Panihati, BJP candidate and the R G Kar victim's mother, Ratna Debnath, faced protests, while her party colleague in Basanti, Bikash Sardar, alleged that "200 to 250 TMC goons" attacked his vehicle and assaulted his driver.
The TMC, meanwhile, accused the central forces of exercising brute force on the general voters at Falta's Belsingha village, especially women, who were beaten up during a move to disperse a crowd from near a polling station.The party also alleged CAPF high-handedness on women and a four-year-old child at Sathachhia in Howrah and on villagers at Ausgram in Purba Bardhaman district.
"In the name of ensuring security, central force jawans are not sparing even women who were brutally lathi-charged. TMC protests this highhandedness of the male jawans who exercised brute force on unarmed villagers. We draw the EC's attention to such illegal actions of the CAPF and ask the poll body to issue cease-and-desist orders against such use of force. We believe, people of Bengal will respond to this on EVMs," Anirban Banerjee, party spokesperson, said.
The BJP alleged that in several polling stations in Falta, the option to vote for the party was blocked using a tape over EVM poll buttons, and demanded repolls in the affected booths.
The state’s Chief Electoral Officer Manoj Agarwal said repolling was likely to be announced in booths where EVMs were found tampered with. However, the order will only be issued after authorities receive reports from the district election officer or election observers regarding allegations of EVM tampering, such as using tapes or a blot of ink, he said.
