The battle of the big guns in the third edition of the Nigeria Cricket Federation Women’s T20 International Invitational did not disappoint as Rwanda and Nigeria entertained fans with the highest show of skills and sportsmanship at the Tafawa Balewa Square Cricket Oval in Lagos on Saturday.
The Female Yellow Greens were handed their first defeat of the competition by familiar foe and defending champions Rwanda, with the East Africans emerging winners by 39 runs in a tightly contested encounter that determined the leader of the round-robin stage of the tournament.
Rwanda, off the back of a convincing victory against Cameroon on Friday by 126 runs, won the coin toss and decided to bat first against Nigeria. The defending champions created a lot of problems for the tournament host with their pace bowlers early on.
View this post on Instagram
Gisele Ishimwe led Rwanda with 29 runs on 34 balls, while captain Sarah Uwera had 20 on 29 balls. Vumiliya Margueritte and Josaine Nyinrankundineze both took three wickets for the impressive Rwandans.
For Nigeria, Salome Sunday finished with 29 runs on 37 balls, while Lucky Piety, who won the player of the match award for the Female Yellow Greens in the first game against Sierra Leone, had six runs on eight balls. Adekunle Shola (two) and Agboya Peculiar (one) both combined to take three wickets.
Rwanda ended the game with 100 runs on seven wickets with 20 overs, while Nigeria had 61 runs on three wickets with 16.4 overs.
The two teams will be back in action in the finals of the Women’s T20 Invitational on Sunday at 1:30 p.m., with Leke Oyede’s ladies hoping to get their revenge and dethrone the defending champions.
