NEW DELHI: Pakistan will face New Zealand in the final group game of the Women's T20 World Cup and don't be surprised if you see a lot of Indians supporting and cheering on their arch-rivals. India's hopes of reaching the final four rounds of the tournament were severely dented by defeat against Australia and their fate now depends on the outcome of the match between Pakistan and New Zealand.
New Zealand, currently in third place with four points, will secure the final semi-final spot if they beat Pakistan. If Pakistan wins, India, New Zealand and Pakistan will be level on four points each.

In this scenario, India will advance to the semi-finals due to their superior net run rate (NRR). Pakistan's NRR is not very encouraging and at this point it looks like India or New Zealand will move forward.

Indian cricketer Mona Meshram, who has played 26 ODIs and 11 T20Is for India so far, is confident that Pakistan will oust New Zealand on Monday and help India reach the semi-finals.
“This will be the first time that India will cheer for Pakistan. Pakistan should win and give way to India. Not just me, entire India will pray for Pakistan. Please, Pakistan, go and defeat New Zealand,” Mona told an exclusive chat with TimesofIndia.com.

“I want India to reach the semi-finals. I am confident that Pakistan will win against New Zealand. Pakistan has a huge fan base in the UAE and this will boost their confidence,” she added.
Chasing a target of 152 on Sunday, India fell short of the target at 142 for 9. Captain Harmanpreet Kaur remained unbeaten on 54 off 47 balls but her late lead was not enough to surpass the target. Despite the loss, India remain at second place in the points table with two wins and two losses, although their NRR has dropped to 0.322, still ahead of third-placed New Zealand.

Australia, on the other hand, was the first team in the group to reach the last four undefeated, recording four wins in as many games.
Harmanpreet put his foot on the accelerator in the second half of the innings but did not receive enough support from the other end.
“I would like to reiterate that Deepti has the ability to rotate the shot really well. If Richa had fought before Deepti, it would have made a big difference. Richa can accelerate the pace while Deepti can rotate the strike effectively.” “India needed a batsman who could hit hard in this situation,” Mona explained.
“India is the only team that can take on Australia. Both are strong teams and India fought very well against Australia. The only mistake I could see was that Richa Ghosh should have competed before Deepti Sharma.” . This move would have made a significant difference for India. But overall India fought really well.
“Harmanpreet played a captaincy but she got no support from the other end. I would like to emphasize again that Deepti has the ability to rotate the shot really well. If Richa had batted before Deepti, it would have made one.” “The big difference is that Richa can accelerate the run rate while Deepti can rotate the strike effectively. India needed a batsman who could hit hard in this situation.”

With 14 runs needed in the last over, India lost four wickets – Pooja Vastarakar (1), Arundhati Reddy (0), Shreyanka Patil (0) and Radha Yadav (0) – to Annabel Sutherland's magnificent over. Did the Indian batsmen lack intent?
“I don’t think there was any lack of intent. If you look at Shafali, she played the way she normally does. Australia has planned Smriti Mandhana really well. They knew that if Smriti settled in, she could destroy them. It seems so.” “Australia had something concrete planned against Smriti and it looked like she had been caught by them. She loves scoring against them,” she concluded.