India vs South Africa Women June 2026 1st T20I Bengaluru: Shafali Verma 71 off 38
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The M Chinnaswamy Stadium has been the most batter-friendly women's T20I venue in India over the last three years, and the series opener against South Africa Women played out to that template. Shafali Verma's 71 from 38 balls framed India's 188, and Tazmin Brits' 51 in the chase came close to taking the visitors home before the middle-overs spin pair from India put a stop to the partnership. India go one up in the three-match series.
Shafali Verma's 71: the powerplay India needed
Shafali walked in to open the innings with the kind of intent that has been the trademark of her T20I batting since her debut. Twenty-eight off her first 12 balls included three boundaries — two cover drives and a flat-batted pull — and the powerplay total of 62 for one was the platform India built the rest of their innings on. The Bengaluru square was true, the dew was not yet in play, and Shafali's back-foot punch into the off side picked up the bulk of her boundary scoring.
She fell in the 12th over to a slog-sweep that found deep square leg, but by then the platform was set. The middle order added 72 from the next six overs, and the death-overs hitting pushed India to 188 — a number that, in Bengaluru in June, sits at the upper end of the chase-par.
The middle order and the death-overs push
The role of the India captain and the senior middle-order batter is the kind of complement to Shafali's strike-rate template that has worked across the last two India T20I cycles. The partnership took the score from 96 for two to 152 for three between overs 12 and 16, and the lower-order finisher added 28 from 14 in the last two overs.
The shot of the innings — outside of Shafali's boundaries — was the lap-sweep from the India captain in the 17th over for four. It is the shot she has been working on against the right-arm seamer at the death, and the execution at Bengaluru showed up cleanly.
Tazmin Brits and the SA Women chase
Tazmin Brits' opening innings for South Africa Women was the kind of innings the chasing side needed to keep the asking rate in single digits. She scored 51 from 34 balls and stayed at the crease through the powerplay and into the 11th over before a mistimed pull off the leg-spinner ended her stay. The 90-run partnership she built with the senior middle-order batter was the platform that, in different match conditions, could have taken the chase home.
What stood out from her innings was the placement against the spin. She used the depth of the crease against the off-spinner and played the cut shot harder than usual on the Chinnaswamy square. Her boundary count — six fours and one six — was almost all on the off side, which is the read the India bowlers will take into the second T20I.
The India middle-overs spin choke
After Brits fell, the India spin pair — the leg-spinner from one end and the left-arm orthodox from the other — took control of the middle overs. They went for under six an over across the eighth to fifteenth overs and picked up three wickets between them. The chase, which was on track at the 10-over mark, fell behind the asking rate by the time the spinners finished their spells.
The leg-spinner's two for under 25 was the spell that swung the game. She drew the SA Women middle order forward, beat the bat with the leg-break that was drifting in, and the LBW dismissal of the No. 4 in the 13th over was the wicket that broke the chase's spine.
The Chinnaswamy read
This was the kind of game M Chinnaswamy is built for — a high-scoring T20I where both sides went above 160 and the result was settled by a 15-run margin. The dew did not become a factor until the 17th over of the chase, by which time the spinners had already finished their spells, and the seam-up bowlers handled the wet ball well at the death.
The over rate from both sides was healthy, the toss did not turn into a decisive factor on a true surface, and the boundary count — 24 from India, 19 from South Africa — reflects the gap on the night.
What to watch
The series moves to Mumbai for the second T20I in two days. The Brabourne Stadium has historically been a higher-scoring venue than even Bengaluru, and the dew window opens earlier in June than in the home summer. For South Africa Women, the top order needs to find a second batter to score alongside Brits at her strike rate; for India, the spin pair will be the matchup the SA Women coaching staff target with a left-hander promotion.
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Aanya Iyer
Expert in: InternationalCricket analyst and content writer at CricJosh, covering International with 31 articles published.
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