Presently placed at the bottom of the points table in the ongoing inaugural edition of the Women’s Premier League 2023, the Royal Challengers Bangalore Women are playing a must-win match against the Gujarat Giants, at the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai. The Giants, who too have found themselves in a do-or-die situation, have won the Toss and elected to bat bat first.
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Both the teams have come up with a change each to their playing XI from the previous match. Renuka Singh Thakur, who has had a pretty ordinary tournament so far, has made way for the left-arm spinner Preeti Bose.
On the other hand, medium pacer Mansi Joshi has been left out of the Giants playing XI tonight, with capped Indian batter Sabbhineni Meghana replacing her.
How can RCB qualify for playoffs 2023 WPL*
First things first, in case the RCB lose their ongoing fixture against the Giants, they automatically exit from the playoffs race and the tournament. With just a solitary victory after six matches so far, they are presently holding the wooden spoon with two points under their belt, and with a Net Run Rate (NRR) of -1.550.
As of yesterday, they not only required to win their remaining two league matches, but had to expect a few other results to go their way as well.
However, one such result from the previous match today, has all but eliminated them from the playoffs qualification race.
The UP Warriorz defeated the Mumbai Indians women by 5 wickets, to hand the latter their first loss in WPL 2023. The result has meant that the Warriorz now have six points under their belt, and are presently placed at the third spot in the table, with a NRR of -0.117 (better than RCB).
RCB thus, will have to not only win the ongoing match plus the last league match versus the Indians Women, but would have to triumph with a huge margin to go ahead of the Warriorz (and maybe Gujarat) on the NRR count.
However, this alone won’t suffice. They would also have to hope that the Warriorz lose their remaining two matches as well, and then they somehow sneak ahead of them on the NRR column.
All in all, only a never-seen-before miracle can help RCB qualify for the WPL 2023 playoffs.
*UPDATE: RCB women can qualify for playoffs if:
– Gujarat Giants defeat UP Warriorz by at least 41 runs
– RCB beat MI Women by 41 runs
– Delhi Capitals beat UP Warriorz by 41 runs.
Mumbai Indians Women qualify
With 10 points under their belt, the Harmanpreet Kaur-led Mumbai Indians women have already qualified for the WPL 2023 playoffs.
Only a total of three teams (out of five) will qualify for the playoffs stage, with the table-topper after the end of the league stage to qualify directly for the grand finale.
Read more on the WPL 2023 playoffs rules by clicking here.
UPDATE: With UP Warriorz winning their match against Gujarat Giants by 3 wickets, RCB Women are officially eliminated from WPL 2023 playoffs, and are out of the tournament.
