Nashra Sandhu makes history as Pakistan storm into Asia Cup semis

Nashra Sandhu delivered a stunning six-wicket spell to help Pakistan beat Hong Kong by 72 runs on Monday and book a place in the Women’s T20 Asia Cup.

Barely 48 hours after their big defeat to India at Dubai International Stadium, Pakistan returned to the same ground to face Hong Kong with a place in the last four at stake.

Pakistan, who suffered a stunning batting collapse against India, slumping from 27 for no loss to 55 all out, put up a much better performance with the bat.

Opener Shawaal Zulfiqar top-scored with 47 off 35 balls, while number 4 batter Ayesha Zafar (26) and skipper Fatima Sana (24) also chipped in with important cameos.

For Hong Kong, medium pacer Joyleen Kaur was the pick of the bowlers with impressive figures of 4-0-19-4.

In reply, Hong Kong had no answer to the Pakistani bowling unit as Sandhu (4-0-7-6) broke the back of their batting line-up with a fantastic display of left-arm spin bowling.

Sandhu became the first Pakistan bowler in history to claim a six-wicket haul in women’s T20 internationals.

Despite the easy win, skipper Fatima refused to get carried away ahead of their semifinal clash against Sri Lanka.

“I think in the batting side we need more, like strike rotation in the batting, and we need more partnerships. And we will try to sit together and discuss these things,” Fatima said.

“So we just go and sit together and discuss a lot of things before the semifinal because we know that it's a knockout match, so we will try.”