(Cricket news) On Saturday, India women lost against England by 9 wickets in the first T20I. Rain delayed the match by half and hour after which India were completely outplayed. After being put into bat first India managed only 132/7 in 20 overs. Smriti Mandhana, Harmanpreet Kaur and Deepti Sharma were the only 3 players to score 20 or more runs. England spinner Sarah Glenn was the star of the show as she picked up 4 wickets. Jemimah Rodrigues was arguably India's best player at the Commonwealth Games and she was surprisingly dropped from the side. The lack of a big hitter in the side was a really big issue and India tried to fix it by bringing in Richa Ghosh, K.P Navgire and Dayalan Hemalatha. While this was a progressive move, dropping Rodrigues was incredibly harsh after the kind of performances she gave in the high pressure Commonwealth Games. 

Having just 133 runs to defend, India never looked up for the task. They dropped a catch and got a wicket off a no ball early on but nothing after that. Left arm spinner Radha Yadav got injured while fielding and couldn't bowl a single ball. India were a mess in the field and gave away too many extra runs. In the post match presentation when asked about the match, skipper Harmanpreet Kaur said "I just feel today we forcefully played because it was not 100% conditions for cricket to play. Still I am happy with the way girls put in the effort because when there are chances to get injured they are ready to play. one of our players got injured also. She was our main bowler and that's why we were lacking."

Harmanpreet Kaur's comments after losing weren't exactly what you expect from a captain. England had to play on the same ground and on top of that they had to field before India. The fielding of this Indian team barring a couple of players was absolutely abysmal. Even the running between wickets is not up to international standard. Harmanpreet Kaur is the long term captain of team India and these kinds of comments will not be helpful in her reign. The match was not even a close contest, hence it is surprising that Harmanpreet Kaur didn't express any disappointment over her team's performance and rather decided to complain about the conditions. India will have a chance to level the series but they will have to play a lot better than they did in the first match.

Also read: Sri Lanka's Asia Cup hero Rajapaksa dedicates Asia Cup title to 'crisis-hit' countrymen