BRISTOL: India Women were left with a mountain to climb in the one-off Test against England as they were forced to follow on after being shot out for 231 in their first innings during the morning session of the third day here on Friday.
After a dramatic collapse on the second day on Thursday, India's batting woes continued as they lost five wickets for the addition of just 44 runs in 21.2 overs, undoing the tremendous effort by 17-year-old Shafali verma (96) and Smriti Mandhana (78).
Debutants Deepti Sharma (29 not out) and Pooja Vastrakar (12) put up a 33-run stand for the ninth wicket but could not save the team from follow on in response to England's first innings of 396 for 9 declared.
Trailing by 165 runs, India were 29 for 1 at lunch after Mandhana was dismissed for 8.
India still trail by 136 runs with nine-second innings wickets in hand.
Debutant Verma was batting beautifully on 20 off just 14 balls, with the help of 5 boundaries.
The Indian batters struggled in their first innings against the England spin duo of Sophie Ecclestone (4/88), who was the main tormentor, and Heather Knight (2/7) for most part before pacers Katherine Brunt and Anya Shrubsole took the last two wickets.
India scored their first runs of the day after 20 balls and by then had lost two wickets including the crucial one of vice captain Harmanpreet Kaur.
Harmanpreet was out after an England review in the second over of the day without adding anything to her overnight score of four.
She was ruled leg before off Ecclestone.
Tanya Bhatia fell two overs later without disturbing the scorer after facing six balls.
She too was dismissed by Ecclestone, who then dismissed Sneh Rana (2) with a turning delivery to reduce India to 197 for 8.
England took the new ball after 80 overs and the Indian first innings ended 1.2 overs after that with the dismissal of Pooja Vastrakar (12) and Jhulan Goswami.