Indian batter Yastika Bhatia created history on Sunday, becoming the first-ever woman to score a Test century at the Lord’s Cricket Ground. She accomplished the landmark achievement during the third day of the ongoing One-Off Test match between England and India, which appears to be in India's favour. The left-handed batter played a gritty knock, bringing up his hundred from 145 deliveries.
Overall, she knocked off 113 runs off 158 balls, slamming 14 boundaries during her innings. This was also her maiden Test century. Notably, Bhatia made tremendous use of the reprieve she got earlier in the innings when she was on 39, with England bowler Lauren Bell striking the off stump, but the bail surprisingly stayed on, giving Bhatia a reprieve. With the help of her innings, India were able to set England a challenging target of 457.
Earlier, India, after being asked to bat, were bowled out for 285 in their first innings. Smriti Mandhana, Harmanpreet Kaur, and Deepti Sharma played good knocks of 83, 58 and 57, respectively. For England, Sophie Ecclestone took three wickets while Lauren Filer and Issy Wong took two wickets each.
England, meanwhile, in their first innings, were folded for 170. India, on the other hand, in their second innings, scored 341/7 before declaring. As things stand, England have a mountain to climb as they are struggling at 130/6 in chase of 457.