Shafali Verma raced to a 25-ball 50 and, with Yastika Bhatia, put India on course as they beat the ECB Development XI by seven wickets in Chelmsford on Monday.
The chase was clinical: Shafali and Yastika shared a 77-run stand off 42 balls that erased the 154/6 target, and India wrapped the victory with three overs to spare. Smriti Mandhana swung the momentum early, hitting 15 runs in the first over of the reply, and the platform they built left little for the middle order to do even with a reshuffled batting lineup.
The weight of the result was in the numbers. England’s Development XI slumped to 16/3 inside the third over after a PowerPlay in which Arundhati Reddy grabbed two wickets in a single over. Joanne Gardner and Sophia Smale rebuilt and carried the hosts to 154/6, but they could not convert that recovery into a parry that would unsettle India’s chase.
The match was the first of two warm-up games before India begin a three-match T20I tour of England later this month. Yastika Bhatia returned to the side for the fixture, and Bharti Fulmali slotted in at number four in Harmanpreet Kaur’s absence — Kaur was not in the Chelmsford squad because she had travelled to New Delhi to receive the Padma Shri.
There were individual milestones and fresh faces. Nandni Sharma ran a first single for the senior side and bowled three economical overs without taking a wicket, a tidy contribution as India look to broaden their bowling options. By contrast, Shreyanka Patil sent down three overs at 10.33 an over and will know the attack needs greater control as tougher opposition approaches.
On the surface the game read as a confidence-boosting exercise: a quickfire half-century, a substantial partnership and a chase finished comfortably. Mandhana, the vice-captain, underlined that the mood in the camp is built on work done away from the cameras, saying it comes down to belief and confidence and the effort behind the scenes as the team prepares for the T20 World Cup in England.
But the contest also exposed a seam of uncertainty for India’s preparation. The bowling, which produced early breakthroughs through Reddy, ended the day showing both promise and volatility — Gardner and Smale’s recovery carried the Development XI to a defendable total and a few expensive overs from the seam department hinted at areas that still need tightening. Nandni’s economical spell was encouraging without the reward of wickets; elsewhere, inconsistency in the middle overs left room for concern.
For Shafali Verma, though, the match was confirmation of form. Her 25-ball fifty did the heavy lifting and gave India a clear short-term answer to questions about strike options at the top of the order. The practical result is straightforward: India leave Chelmsford with a seven-wicket win and momentum ahead of the remaining warm-up and the three-match T20I series to follow.
The next chapter is immediate. India have one more warm-up to fine-tune combinations before the scheduled tour matches later in May, and the team must balance the confidence from a commanding chase with the unresolved work in the bowling unit. If Shafali keeps swinging like this and the bowlers find consistency, India will go into the tour — and into World Cup preparations — as a clearer, calmer unit. If not, the Chelmsford win will be remembered as a useful exercise rather than the answer to the deeper questions it raised.
