New Zealand walked over Sri Lanka by eight wickets on Saturday in the T20 World Cup Group A encounter and the outcome of this match has kept the race for semi-final spots wide open in the T20 Women’s Cricket World Cup. The match between New Zealand and Sri Lanka was a one-sided contest as New Zealand restricted Sri Lanka to 115 runs and chased down the target with 8 wickets and 15 balls to spare. New Zealand opener Georgia Plimmer took charge of their run chase and scored 53 of 44 balls including 4 boundaries. Finally, skipper Sophie Devine and Amelia Kerr chased down the target with the skipper ending the match with a six. For Sri Lanka, the skipper Chamari Athapaththu scored an impressive 35 of 41 balls before the New Zealand spinners restricted the total to 115.

This match also recorded the fourth consecutive defeat for the defending champions Sri Lanka and this meant they bowed out of the tournament with zero points. New Zealand are now neck to neck with India for the second semi-final spot from Group A.

Although the Indian team scores much better in net run rate (NRR), a poor performance against table-toppers Australia in the final group match might seal their fate. India, having lost to New Zealand earlier, cannot afford to lose another game with Australia. India must defeat Australia and hope that Pakistan posts a superior performance against New Zealand. In case, India loses the NRR will have a final say. At the moment, India has an NRR of +0.576 which is much better than New Zealand at +0.282.

Even Pakistan is not completely out of the equation for a spot in the semi-finals. If they manage to beat New Zealand their NRR will see a significant boost and Australia will have to perform poorly in their upcoming matches.