Jemimah Rodrigues smashes her fastest fifty in T20Is

Jemimah Rodrigues ended her run drought at the Dr Dy Patil Sports University Stadium in Navi Mumbai with a fiery fifty against the West Indies women on December 15 (Sunday). 

Batting at number three for the Indian side in the first T20I of the three-match series, the right-handed batter smashed a 28-ball fifty, her fastest in the T20I format of the game. This was also the eighth-fastest fifty by an Indian woman in the format. 

Rodriguez, who had scored just 46 runs in six innings at the venue in Navi Mumbai before this game, was at the top of her craft, sweeping, reverse-sweeping, playing paddle sweeps and pulling pacers over the deep fine-leg boundary for sixes. 

She was the one who threw Karishma Ramharack off her lengths by applying unorthodox shots such as the reverse sweep. 

From a strike rate of 82.6 in her last six outings at the venue, she accelerated her scoring rate to nearly 200 for most of her innings before reaching the fifty-run mark. She was 45 off 23 balls and just one six away from scoring the joint-fastest fifty for India.

However, Jemimah just slowed down a bit towards the landmark. It was the 12th fifty in the shortest format of the game for the 24-year-old as she eventually reached the fifty-run mark. 

Before this knock, the pocket-sized dynamo had smashed a 29-ball fifty against South Africa Women in July 2024, just ahead of the T20 World Cup. 

Thanks to her brilliant knock of 73 off just 35 balls, India surpassed their previous highest T20I total (185) against West Indies, achieved in St Lucia in 2019. 

The Women in Blue finished with 195 runs on the board, putting themselves in the pole position at the end of the first innings. This is also India's third-highest total in WT20Is.

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