Goswami leads India to consolation win

India Women broke their run of defeats by beating New Zealand Women by three wickets in the third-place playoff of the NatWest Women's T20 Quadrangular Series at Aldershot.

Having suffered three straight losses during the group stage, India chased down New Zealand's 95 with a ball to spare. India's captain Jhulan Goswami was the star, guiding her side home with a cool 33 not out from 28 balls. In a low-scoring encounter, New Zealand were left to rue the 10 wides and three no balls they sent down.

The chase was by no means certain when India were reduced to 24 for 3 but Harmanpreet Kaur (14) and Veda Krishnamurthy (15) helped them recover and laid the foundations for Goswami to finish the job.

It was an unhappy farewell to Twenty20 cricket for New Zealand's captain Aimee Watkins. She retires after the upcoming ODIs and had started well at the top of the order, making 15, before becoming the second of two wickets for Amita Sharma.

At one stage, when they were 61 for 3, New Zealand looked capable of posting a threatening score but Liz Perry fell for 18 and the lower order couldn't carry on. Amy Satterthwaite top-scored with 35 but it wasn't enough.

"We needed this win very badly before the start of the ODI series," Goswami said. "This win will give us much needed momentum because we did not have any so far. I hope we carry this into the ODI series. You must remember that we beat a good side like New Zealand. All four sides are evenly matched, but we had not got up on the victory column as yet.

"I told my coach (Anju Jain) that I need to bat up the order and she agreed. If I had not taken the responsibility, the result may have been different. The win came at the right time. You must remember that we were playing for the third place in a world tournament."

Watkins said: "Everyone's really disappointed. I think the wicket was the reason. We obviously we did not get a big score on the board. While bowling, we were all over the place and we bowled both sides of the wicket. We also gave away too many extras I think.''