Women's WC IND vs PAK: Need to be in top flight

The Indian womenrsquos cricket would hope that its bowlers find top form to complement a solid batting unitrsquos efforts when it begins its quest for an elusive ICC World Cup trophy with the opening match against archrivals Pakistan here on SundayRunners up in the 2017 and 2005 editions India are eager to go one step ahead and claim the title that has eluded them especially skipper Mithali Raj and veteran pacer Jhulan Goswami who will be playing their last World CupThe Indian team reached New Zealand a month earlier in order to acclimatise to the conditionsBowling a concernHowever the bowlers struggled compared to the batting unit which managed to score in excess of 250 runs five times in the seven 50 over outings including two warmup matchesThe bowling unit let the team down throughout the series against New Zealand which India lost 14 They did put up a much improved performance in the fifth ODI and the two warmup games and Raj will hope that bth the batting and bowling units can fire in unison ldquoFrom the past series or the warmup games all we can take is confidence and how you negotiate the conditions in the middle how you play according to the situation is just very importantrdquo said Mithali in the prematch virtual press conferenceMithali said Pakistan is a good side and her team wonrsquot take them lightly in their campaign opener ldquoI think Pakistan is also a good side and I am sure they have prepared very hard for the tournament and so have weldquoEvery team here we canrsquot take any team lightly So we will get into playing every game with a lot of intensity and with a lot of confidencerdquo she saidldquoAs a team we are excited to get into the World Cup and starting our campaign tomorrow We are not looking at it as Pakistan we are playing against we are looking at a team which has come prepared and we are equally prepared to put our best foot forward We want to set a momentum going into the tournament and that is how we look at the tournamentrdquoWill Harmanpreet bowlHowever it remains to be seen if Mithali hands the ball to Harmanpreet Kaur The team would have breathed a sigh of relief after Kaur found herself among runs after a prolonged rough patchPakistan on the other hand are the lowest ranked team eight in the tournament They qualified for the World Cup owing to their ranking after the qualifiers were cancelled midway last year due to COVID19Having ended three times at the bottom Pakistanrsquos bestever finish at the World Cup had come in 2009 when they reached the Super 6 stage They will be hoping they can make the knockouts in this editionBismah Maroof and Co are also coming off backtoback wins in the warm up matches They beat New Zealand before getting the better of BangladeshThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever