Pakistan's stand-in skipper Nida Dar has created in T20I cricket. Nida became the leading wicket-taker in women's T20Is with the wicket of England skipper Heather Knight at Newlands, Cape Town on February 21. Dar dethroned West Indies Anisa Mohammed from the top. Anisa has 125 wickets from 117 matches at an average of 17.64. Nida reached the summit in her 130th T20I game.
Captaining the side in the absence of Bismah Maroof, Nida introduced herself in the sixth over and went for 13 runs. She continued and conceded 12 runs in her second over. She returned into bowl in the 13th over and got the wicket of Knight off the third delivery. She could have got the wicket of Amy Jones as well if not for the dropped chance.
Nida completed her quota of four overs in the 17th over of the innings. She was expensive again as she conceded three boundaries. She leaked runs at 11.80 economy rate. She got the consolation wicket of Knight but ended up conceding 47 runs.
It was a poor outing for Pakistan bowlers as they were hit all around the park by England batters Danielle Wyatt, Nat Sciver-Brunt and Jones. Wyatt scored 33-ball 59 whereas Nat remained unbeaten for 40-ball 81 which included 12 fours and one six. Wicketkeeper-batter Amy scored 47 runs from 31 balls as England posted a mammoth total of 213, the highest in history of women's T20 World Cup. The previous highest total belonged to South Africa who scored 195/3 against Thailand in 2020 edition of the tournament.
Nida did not have a good outing with the bat either and got stumped out after scoring 11 runs from 14 deliveries. She lost her wicket to Sarah Glenn.
Chasing Nida
From the current lot of players, Australia's Megan Schutt and Ellyse Perry are third and fourth on the list respectively with 122 wickets each. Also, South Africa pacer Shabnim Ismail has 117 wickets. For India, Deepti Sharma recently became the first bowler to take 100 or more T20I wickets.
Most WC scalps for Pakistan
This was also the 36-year-old spinner's 27th scalp in women T20 World Cup. She is the eighth-highest wicket-taker in the tournament's history.
